LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Vf{i20 

Sfjap , Ccftijrigfjt fa. 

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 






GASTRIC DERANGEMENTS. 



HORSFORD'S ACID PHOSPHATE. 



Unlike all other forms of phosphorus in combination, such as dilute 
phosphoric acid, glacial phosphoric acid, neutral phosphate of lime, hypo- 
phosphites, etc., the phosphates in this product are in solution, and readily 
assimilable by the system, and it not only causes no trouble with the 
digestive organs, but promotes in a marked degree their healthful action. 

In certain forms of dyspepsia it acts as a specific. 

Dr. H. R. Merville, Milwaukee, Wis., says: " I regard it as val- 
uable in the treatment of gastric derangements affecting digestion." 

Dr. E. Osborne, Mason City, la., says: "I consider it a valuable 
addition to the remedies in use for the relief of gastric disorders depend- 
ent on enervation." 

Dr. Albert Day, Superintendent of the Washington Home, Bos- 
ton, says: " For several years I have used it in cases of alcoholism and 
gastric irritation. It is of special value." 

Dr. T. G. Comstock, of the Good Samaritan Hospital, St. Louis, 
says: " For some years we have used it in a variety of derangements 
characterized by debilky, as also in chronic gastric ailments. It is ap- 
proved of, unanimously, by the medical staff of this Hospital." 

Dr. G. W. Whitney, Marshall, Minn., says: "I have used it in 
debility of the nervous system, and deranged condition of all the secre- 
tory organs. I esteem it highly." 



Send for descriptive circular. Physicians who wish to test it will be 
furnished a bottle on application, without expense except express 
charges. 

Prepared under the direction of Prof. E. N. Horsford, by the 

EUMFOED CHEMICAL WORKS, Providence, B. I. 



Beware of Substitutes and. Imitations. 

CAUTION: — Be sure Wie word tc Mors ford's " is Printed on the label. 
All others are sptirious. Never sold in bulJe. 



CONTRIBUTIONS OF PHYSICIANS 



TO 



ENGLISH AND /MERICAN LITERATURE. 



BY 



ROBERT C. KENNER, A. M., M. D. 
n 







1892. 
GEORGE S. DAVIS, 

DETROIT, MICH. 






Copyrighted by 

GEORGE S. DAVIS. 

1892. 



THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED 

TO 

MR. PAUL KRATZ, OF LOUISVILLE, KY., 

BETWEEN WHOM AND THE AUTHOR THERE HAS EXISTED THE 

WARMEST FRIENDSHIP SINCE THE FIRST MOMENT 

OF THEIR ACQUAINTANCE. 



PREFACE. 



The object of this little volume is to give an account of 
the activity of physicians in the field of general literature. 
It is impossible in a volume of this size to give more than an 
outline of the subject, and I have considered only the most 
prominent authors. Anything like a complete list would 
require several large volumes. I have frequently used 
selections which are used in Chambers' and in Cleveland's 
works on English literature, and here make acknowledgment. 

ROBERT C. KENNER. 

Louisville, Ky , July i, 1892. 



CONTRIBUTIONS OF PHYSICIANS TO ENGLISH 
AND AMERICAN LITERATURE. 

" But the knowledge of nature is only half the 
task of a poet; he must be acquainted likewise 
with all the modes of life. His character requires 
that he estimate the happiness and misery of every 
condition; observe the power of all the passions in all 
their combinations, and trace the changes of the 
human mind as they are modified by various institu- 
tions and accidental influences of climate or custom, 
from the sprightliness of infancy to the despondence 
of decrepitude. * * * His labor is not yet at 
an end; he must know many languages and many 
sciences." — Samuel Johnson. 

The writer of prose or poetry who would produce 
works which contain thoughts and inferences which 
will go down to posterity must of necessity be ac- 
quainted with the passions of men in all grades of 
society. Mere scholarship can never make up this 
want, and the monk, versed in all the erudition of the 
ages, would come far short of producing poems which 
would touch the heart of a nation as do those of 
Robert Burns. Shakespeare was acquainted with the 
hopes and fears of all classes. He was really a man 
of all the people, and had mingled in their loves and 
hates and known the slavery of poverty and the lib- 
erty of wealth, and he was the greatest interpreter of 



the human heart and mind that has ever given the 
resources of his study to the world. Blair properly- 
denned poetry to be " the language of passion." 
Without an acquaintance with the doings of the low, 
the great, the wise, and the simple, it is not easy to 
imagine how a poet, a man of genius, can breathe 
into his productions the breath of passion. Of course, 
being learned, he could imitate, but the imitation 
would be transparent and altogether lack the color- 
ing of nature, which is obtained by contact with the 
world, and which makes the idealistic creature of the 
true poet a real personage. Those authors, then, 
who have left behind works which will always be read 
and cherished, have been children of nature and citi- 
zens of the actual world, have known how hardships 
affect the heart, and been participants in the struggle 
with opposition and disappointment for place and 
recognition in the world. 

When one reads the " Traveller," he feels with 
Goldsmith that love of country which beams through- 
out the poem, and he enters with delight into those 
splendid meditations upon the countries through which 
he roamed as a wandering musician. Goldsmith knew 
the common ambitions, passions, and aims of the people 
in all these countries, and easily turned this treasured 
knowledge into immortal verse. Now the physician, 
more than any other man in society, occupies the 
position to observe the ways and passions of all. He 
is called when death is about to remove the loved one 



from the family circle, and is almost daily called to 
witness the most vivid depictures of the passions. He 
goes to the palace of the rich, and to the poor man's 
hovel, and to the den of wickedness, where he often 
has to remain long, and of course is compelled to 
learn more or less of their actions, superstitions, and 
modes of life. To him the matron and the maid, the 
saint and the sinner, open their hearts, and nothing 
is withheld. He is then eminently in the place to 
observe all those qualities of heart and mind which 
form such a large part of the poet's essential knowl- 
edge. I shall not go back much beyond the Eliza- 
bethan period. Beyond that time the medical sci- 
ences had not begun the great strides which charac- 
terize their march after Harvey's discovery. This 
brilliant period of intellectual vigor, like every subse- 
quent one, has witnessed a number of physicians who 
have found rest and recreation in their contributions 
to literature. 

I shall consider as the starting point of this 
essay, then, the time which may be looked upon as 
the period when the discovery of the circulation of 
the blood may be said to have gained common recog- 
nition. It is well known to all students of medical 
literature that many refused to believe in Harvey's 
discovery. 

A poet, whose fame is imperishable and whose 
heart was filled with poetic sympathies, was Henry 
Yaughan (1621-1695). He was always poor, and the 



— 4 — 

history of his life is the record of many sad and 
rigorous experiences. „ Yet his poems show that the 
fire of true genius lit up his way. It has been said 
that his poems are harsh, and Campbell is not disposed 
to give the poet great credit. I believe those who 
read his poems with an honest desire to discern his 
excellences will not fail to find them beset with some 
of the most radiant gems that scintillate in the coronet 
of the truly inspired bard. He was a devoted Chris- 
tian, and his works are largely of a religious character. 
The following specimens of his poetry will give 
the reader an idea of his powers and the tenor of his 
thoughts: 

EARLY RISING AND PRAYER. 

When first thy eyes unveil, give thy soul leave 

To do the like; our bodies but forerun 
The spirit's duty: true hearts spread and heave 

Unto their God, as flowers do to the sun; 
Give Him thy first thoughts then, so shalt thou keep 
Him company all day, and in Him sleep. 
Yet never sleep the sun up; prayer should 

Dawn with the day: there are set awful hours 
'Twixt heaven and us; the manna was not good 

After sun rising; far day sullies flowers: 
Rise to prevent the sun; sleep doth sins glut, 
And heaven's gate opens when the world's is shut. 
Walk with thy fellow-creatures; note the hush 

And whisperings amongst them. Not a spring 
Or leaf but hath his morning hymn; each bush 

And oak doth know I Am. Can'st thou not sing? 
O leave thy cares and follies ! Go this way, 
And thou art sure to prosper all the day. 



— 5 — 

Serve God before the world: let Him not go 

Until thou hast a blessing; then resign 
The whole under Him. and remember who 

Prevailed by wrestling ere the sun did shine; 
Pour oil upon the stones, weep for thy sin, 
Then journey on, and have an eye to heaven. 

Mornings are mysteries; the first the world's youth, 
Man's resurrection, and the future's bud, 

Shroud in their births; the crown of life, light, truth, 
Is styled their star; the stone and hidden food; 

Three blessings wait upon them, one of which 

Should move — they make us holy, happy, rich. 

When the world's up, and every swarm abroad, 
Keep well thy temper, mix not with each clay; 

Despatch necessities; life hath a load 

Which must be carried on and safely may; 

Yet keep those cares without thee; let the heart 

Be God's alone, and choose the better part. 

THE RAINBOW. 

Still young and fine, but what is still in view 

We slight as old and soiled, though fresh and new. 

How bright wert thou when Shem's admiring eye 

Thy burnished naming arch did first descry; 

When Zerah, Nahor, Haran, Abram, Lot, 

The youthful world's gray fathers, in one knot 

Did with intentive looks watch every hour 

For thy new light, and tremble at each shower ! 

And when thou doth shine, darkness looks white and 

fair; 
Forms turn to music, clouds to smiles and air; 
Rain gently spends his honey-drops, and pours 



— 6 — 

Balm on the cleft earth, milk on grass and flowers. 
Bright pledge of peace and sunshine, the sure tie 
Of thy Lord's hand, the object of His eye ! 
When I behold thee, though my light be dim, 
Distinct and low, I can in thine see Him, 
Who looks upon thee from His glorious throne, 
And minds the covenant betwixt all and One. 

John Locke (1632-1704). — One of the most re- 
splendent intellects which has ever dawned upon this 
planet was that of John Locke. He left to posterity 
his essay " On Human Understanding " and other 
great works which have enriched our literature in a 
monumental manner. Locke was the son of a gentle- 
man of small fortune, and received his education 
mostly at Oxford. He had not been practicing medi- 
cine long before he was called to attend the Earl of 
Shaftesbury. He succeeded in relieving or curing 
this nobleman of a troublesome affection, and the 
patient, as is many times the case, became warmly 
attached to his physician; for years they were friends, 
and his fortune rose and fell with that of the EarL 
He was forced at one time on account of political 
persecutions to fly to Holland for an asylum. While 
stopping in Holland, he was often compelled to 
remain hidden in the most secluded portions of the 
country to avoid detection and capture by relentless 
enemies. But when the Prince of Orange ascended 
the British throne he was allowed to return to his 
native England and live in comparative exemption 



from disturbance of political strife and jealousy. We 
give some selections taken at random from his works, 
which will give the reader an idea of the profundity 
of this great physician's intellect: 

"CHRISTMAS CEREMONIES AT CLEVES. 

" About one in the morning I went a-gossiping to 
our Lady. Think me not profane, for the name is a 
great deal modester than the service I was at. I 
shall not describe all the particulars I observed in 
that church, being the principal of the Catholics in 
Cieves; but only those that were particular to the 
occasion. Near the high altar was a little altar for 
this day's solemnity; the scene was a stable wherein 
was an ox, an ass, a cradle, the Virgin, the Babe, 
Joseph, shepherds, and angels, dramatis persona. 
Had they but given them motion, it had been a per- 
fect puppet-play, and might have deserved pence 
apiece; for they were of the same size and make that 
our English puppets are; and I am confident these 
shepherds and this Joseph are kin to that Judith and 
Holophernes which I have seen at Bartholomew Fair. 
A little without the stable was a flock of sheep, cut 
out of cards; and these, as they then stood without 
their shepherds, appeared to me the best emblem I 
had seen a long time, and methought represented 
these poor innocent people, who, whilst their shep- 
herds pretend so much to follow Christ, and pay their 
devotion to Him, are left unregarded in the barren 



— 8 — 

wilderness. This was the show; the music to it was 
all vocal in the quire adjoining, but such as I never 
heard. They had strong voices, but so ill-tuned, so 
ill-managed, that it was their misfortune, as well as 
ours, that they could be heard. He that could not, 
though he had a cold, make better music with a 
chevy chase over a pot of smooth ale, deserved well 
to pay the reckoning, and go away athirst. However, 
they were the honestest singing-men I have ever 
seen, for they endeavoured to earn their money, and 
earned it certainly with pains enough; for what they 
wanted in skill, they made up in loudness and variety. 
Every one had his own tune, and the result of all was 
like the noise of choosing parliament-men, where 
every one endeavours to cry loudest. Besides the 
men, there were a company of little choristers. I 
thought, when I saw them at first, they had danced 
to the other's music, and that it had been your Gray's 
Inn revels; for they were jumping up and down about 
a good charcoal fire that was in the middle of the 
quire — this their devotion and their singing was 
enough, I think, to keep them warm, though it were 
a very cold night — but it was not dancing but singing 
they served for; for, when it came to their turns, away 
they ran to their places, and there they made as good 
harmony as a concert of little pigs would, and they 
were much about as cleanly. Their part being done, 
out they sallied again to the fire, where they played 
till their cue called them, and then back to their 



—\9 re- 
places they huddled. So negligent and slight are 
they in their service in a place where the nearness of 
adversaries might teach them to be more careful." 

"CAUSES OF WEAKNESS IN MEN'S UNDERSTANDINGS. 

"There is, it is visible, great variety in men's 
understandings, and theiF natural constitutions put so 
wide a difference between some men in this respect, 
that art and industry would never be able to master; 
and their very natures seem to want a foundation to 
raise on it that which other men easily attain unto. 
Amongst men of equal education, there is great in- 
equality of parts. And the woods of America, as 
well as the schools of Athens, produce men of several 
abilities in the same kind. Though this be so, yet I 
imagine men come very short of what they might 
attain unto in their several degrees, by a neglect of 
their understandings. A few rules of logic are 
thought to be sufficient in this case for those who 
pretend to the highest improvement ; whereas I think 
there are a great many natural defects in the under- 
standing capable of amendment, which are overlooked 
and wholly neglected. And it is easy to perceive 
that men are guilty of a great many faults in the ex- 
ercise and improvement of this faculty of the mind, 
which hinder them in their progress, and keep them 
in ignorance and error all their lives. Some of them 
I shall take notice of, and endeavor to point out 
proper remedies for, in the following discourse. 



IO 

" Besides the want of determined ideas, and of 
sagacity and exercise in finding out and laying in 
order intermediate ideas, there are three miscarriages 
that men are guilty of in reference to their reason, 
whereby this faculty is hindered in them from that 
service it might do and was designed for. And he 
that reflects upon the actions and discourses of man- 
kind, will find their defects in this kind very fre- 
quent and very observable. 

" i. The first is of those who seldom reason at 
all, but do and think according to the example of 
others, whether parents, neighbors, ministers, or who 
else they are pleased to make choice of to have an 
implicit faith in, for the saving of themselves the 
pains and trouble of thinking and examining for 
themselves. 

" 2. The second is of those who put passion in 
the place of reason, and being resolved that shall 
govern their actions and arguments, neither use their 
own, nor hearken to other people's reason, any further 
than it suits their humor, interest, or party; and these 
one may observe, commonly content themselves with 
words which have no distinct ideas to them, though, 
in other matters, that they come with an unbiased 
indifferency to, they want not abilities to talk and 
hear reason, where they have no secret inclination 
that hinders them from being untractable to it. 

" 3. The third sort is of those who readily and 
sincerely follow reason, but for want of having that 



which one may call large, sound, round-about sense, 
have not a full view of all that relates to the question, 
and may be of moment to decide it. We are all 
short-sighted, and very often see but one side of a 
matter ; our views are not extended to all that has a 
connection with it. From this defect, I think, no 
man is free. We see but in part and we know but in 
part, and therefore it is no wonder we conclude not 
right from our partial views. This might instruct 
the proudest esteemer of his own parts how useful it 
is to talk and consult with others, even such as came 
short with him in capacity, quickness, and penetra- 
tion ; for since no one sees all, and we generally have 
different prospects of the same thing, according to 
our different, as I may say, positions to it, it is not in- 
congruous to think, nor beneath any man to try, 
whether another may not have notions of things 
which have escaped him, and which his reason would 
make use of if they came into his mind. 

" The faculty of reasoning seldom or never de- 
ceives those who trust to it ; its consequences from 
what it builds on are evident and certain ; but that 
which it oftenest, if not only, misleads us in, is, that 
the principles from which we conclude, the ground 
upon which we bottom our reasoning, are but a part; 
something is left out which should go into the reckon- 
ing to make it just and exact." 



" PLEASURE AND PAIN. 

" The infinitely wise Author of our being, having 
given us the power over several parts of our bodies, 
to move or keep them at rest, as we think fit; and, 
also, by the motions of them, to move ourselves and 
contiguous bodies, in which consist all the actions of 
our body; having also given a power to our mind, 
in several instances, to choose amongst its ideas which 
it will think on, and to pursue the inquiry of this or 
that subject with consideration and attention; to ex- 
cite us to these actions of thinking and motion that 
we are capable of, has been pleased to join to several 
thoughts and several sensations a perception of de- 
light. If this were wholly separated from all our 
outward sensations and inward thoughts, we should 
have no reason to prefer one thought or action to 
another, negligence to attention, or motion to rest. 
And so we should neither stir our bodies nor employ 
our minds; but let our thoughts — if I may so call it — 
run adrift, without any direction or design; and suffer 
the ideas of our minds, like unregarded shadows, to 
make their appearances there, as it happened, without 
attending to them. In which state man, however 
furnished with the faculties of understanding and 
will, would be a very idle, inactive creature, and pass 
his time only in a lazy, lethargic dream. It has there- 
fore pleased our wise Creator to annex several ob- 
jects, and the ideas which we receive from them, as 
also to several of our thoughts, a concomitant pleas- 



— 13 — 
lire, and that in several objects to several degrees, that 
those faculties which He had endowed us with might 
not remain wholly idle and unemployed by us. 

k ' Pain has the same efficacy and use to set us on 
work that pleasure has, we being as ready to employ 
our faculties to avoid that, as to pursue this; only this 
is worth our consideration, ' that pain is often pro- 
duced by the same objects and ideas that produce 
pleasure in us.' This, their near conjunction, which 
makes us often feel pain in the sensations where we 
expected pleasure, gives us new occasion of admiring 
the wisdom and goodness of our Maker, who, design- 
ing the preservation of our being, has annexed pain 
to the application of many things to our bodies, to 
warn us of the harm that they will do, and as advices 
to withdraw from them. But He, not designing our 
preservation barely, but the preservation of every part 
and organ in its perfection, hath, in many cases, an- 
nexed pain to those very ideas which delight us. 
Thus heat, that is very agreeable to us in one degree, 
by a little greater increase of it proves no ordinary 
torment; and the most pleasant of all sensible objects, 
light itself, if there be too much of it, if increased 
beyond a due proportion to our eyes, causes a very 
painful sensation; which is wisely and favorably so 
ordered by nature, that when any object does, by the 
vehemency of its operation, disorder the instruments 
of sensation, whose structures cannot but be very nice 
and delicate, we might by the pain be warned to 



— 14 — 

withdraw before the organ be quite put out of order, 
and so be unfitted for its proper function for the 
future. The consideration of those objects which 
produce it may well persuade us that this is the end 
or use of pain. For, though great light be insuffer- 
able to our eyes, yet the highest degree of darkness 
does not at all disease them; because that causing no 
disorderly motion in it, leaves that curious organ un- 
harmed in its natural state. But yet excess of cold, 
as well as heat, pains us, because it is equally destruc- 
tive to that temper which is necessary to the preser- 
vation of life, and the exercise of the several functions 
of the body, and which consists in a moderate degree 
of warmth, or, if you please, a motion of the insensible 
parts of our bodies, confined within certain bounds. 
Beyond all this we may find another reason why God 
hath scattered up and down several degrees of pleas- 
ure and pain in all the things that environ and affect 
us, and blended them together in almost all that our 
thoughts and senses have to do with; that we, finding 
imperfection, dissatisfaction, and want of complete 
happiness in all the enjoyments which the creatures 
can afford us, might be led to seek it in the enjoy- 
ment of Him ' with whom there is fullness of joy and 
at whose right hand are pleasures for evermore.' '. 

" HISTORY. 

" The stories of Alexander and Caesar, further 
than they instruct us' in the art ot living well and fur- 



— i5 — 
nish us with observations of wisdom and prudence, 
are not one jot to be preferred to the history of Robin 
Hood or the Seven Wise Masters. I do not deny but 
history is very useful and very instructive to human 
life; but if it be studied only for the reputation of be- 
ing a historian it is a very empty thing; and he that 
can tell all the particulars of Herodotus and Plu- 
tarch, Curtius and Livy, without making any other 
use of them, may be an ignorant man with a good 
memory and with all his pains hath only filled his 
head with Christmas tales. And, which is worse, the 
greatest part of the history being made up of wars 
and conquests, and their style, especially the Romans, 
speaking of valour as the chief, if not the only, virtue, 
we are in danger to be misled by the general current 
and business of history; and, looking on Alexander 
and Caesar, and such like heroes, as the highest in- 
stances of human greatness, because they each of 
them caused the death of several hundred thousand 
men, and the ruin of a much greater number, overran 
a great part of the earth and killed the inhabitants to 
possess themselves of their countries — we are apt to 
make butchery and rapine the chief marks and very 
essence of human greatness. And if civil history be a 
great dealer of it, and to many readers thus useless, 
curious and difficult inquirings in antiquity are much 
more so; and the exact dimensions of the Colossus, 
or figure of the Capitol, the ceremonies of the Greek 
and Roman marriages, or who it was that first coined 



— 16 — 

money; these, I confess, set a man well off in the 
world, especially amongst the learned, but set him 
very little on in his way. * * * I shall only add 
one word, and then conclude; and that is, that where- 
as in the beginning I cut off history from our study 
as a useless part, as certainly it is where it is read 
only as a tale that is told; here, on the other side, I 
recommend it to one who hath well settled in his 
mind the principles of morality, and knows how to 
make a judgment on the actions of men, as one of 
the most useful studies he can apply himself to. 
There he shall see a picture of the world and the 
nature of mankind and so learn to think of men as 
they are. There he shall see the rise of opinions and 
find from what slight and sometimes shameful occa- 
sions some of them have taken their rise, which yet 
afterwards have had great authority and passed 
almost for sacred in the world and borne down all 
before them. There also one may learn great and 
useful instructions of prudence and be warned 
against the cheats and rogueries of the world with 
many more advantages which I shall not here enu- 
merate." 

Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682). — Sir Thomas 
Browne was an eccentric but highly intellectual gen- 
tleman who devoted his life to the practice of medi- 
cine and to the cultivation of literature as a pastime. 
Among his admirers were Samuel Johnson, Coleridge, 



— 17 — 

and other great literary luminaries. Dr. Browne was 
a zealous lover of the Latin language, and his 
writings abound with words which are Latin, but 
which are given English terminations. He traveled 
over Ireland and a large part of the continent of 
Europe, and after taking his medical degree at Ley- 
den he commenced the practice of his profession at 
Norwich. In 1642 his " Religio Medici" — The Re- 
ligion of a Physician — a work which at once placed 
him among the most philosophical writers of his time, 
appeared. His next work was " Pseudodoxia Epi- 
demica " — A Treatise on Vulgar Errors. The object 
of this book was to dispel many of the superstitions 
then currently believed by the people. An enumera- 
tion of the absurd beliefs which the author undertook 
to eradicate would be very interesting to us in the 
dawn of the twentieth century, but we have room for 
only a few. It was in Dr. Browne's time commonly 
believed that a crystal " was ice strongly congealed;" 
that diamonds could be softened and dissolved by the 
blood of a goat; that elephants have no joints; that 
storks live only in free states. 

Dr. Browne was without question one of the 
great masters in the literary history of Great Britain; 
he was devoted to the practice of medicine, and con- 
tinued in it until the conclusion of his long life. I 
subjoin some extracts from his works, which cannot 
fail to be read with pleasure: 



— 18 — 

"OBLIVION. 

" What song the Sirens sang, or what name 
Achilles assumed when he hid himself among women, 
though puzzling questions, are not beyond all conjec- 
ture. What time the persons of these ossuaries 
entered the famous nations of the dead and slept 
with princes and counsellors might admit a wide solu- 
tion. But who were the proprietaries of these bones, 
or 'what bodies these ashes made up, were a question 
above antiquarianism; not to be resolved by man, not 
easily perhaps by spirits except we consult the pro- 
vincial guardians of tutelary observators. Had they 
made as good provision for their names as they have 
done for their relics, they had not so grossly erred in 
the art of perpetuation. But to subsist in bones, and 
be put pyramidally extant, is a fallacy in duration. 
Vain ashes, which, in the oblivion of names, persons, 
times, and sexes, have found unto themselves a fruit- 
less continuation, and only arise unto late posterity as 
emblems of mortal vanities, antidotes against pride, 
vainglory, and maddening vices. Pagan vainglories, 
which thought the world might last forever, had 
encouragement for ambition, and, finding no Atropos 
unto the immortality of their names, were never 
damped with the necessity of oblivion. Even old 
ambitions had the advantage of ours in the attempts 
of their vainglories, who, acting early and before the 
probable meridian of time, have by this time found 



— i 9 — 

great accomplishment of their designs, whereby the 
ancient heroes have already outlasted their monu- 
ments and mechanical preservations. But in this lat- 
ter scene of time we cannot expect such mummies 
unto our memories, when ambition may fear the 
prophecy of Elias: (i) and Charles V can never hope 
to live within two Methuselahs of Hector. (2) 

"And therefore restless inquietude for the diutur- 
nity of our memories unto present considerations, 
seems a vanity almost out of date and superannuated 
piece of folly. We cannot hope to live so long in 
our names as some have done in their persons ; one 
face of Janus holds no proportion unto the other. It 
is too late to be ambitious. The great mutations of 
the earth are acted or time may be too short for our 
designs. To extend our memories by monuments, 
whose death we daily pray for, and whose duration 
we cannot hope without injury to our expectations, in 
the advent of the last day, were a contradiction to our 
beliefs. We, whose generations are ordained in this 
•setting apart of time, are providentially taken off 
from such imaginations ; and being necessitated to 
eye the remaining particle of futurity, are naturally 
constituted unto thoughts of the next world and can- 
not excusably decline the consideration of that dura- 
tion which marketh pyramid pillars of snow and all 
that is past a moment. 

" Circles and right lines limit and close all bodies, 
and the mortal right-lined circle (3) must close and 



shut up all. There is no antidote against the opium 
of time, which temporally considereth all things. Our 
fathers find their graves in our short memories, and 
sadly tell us now we may be buried in our survivors. 
Gravestones tell truth scarce forty years. Genera- 
tions pass while some trees stand and old families last 
not three oaks. To be read by bare inscriptions like 
many in Gruter, (4) to hope for eternity by enigmati- 
cal epithets or first letters of our names, to be studied 
by antiquaries who we were, and have new names 
given us, like many of the mummies, are cold conso- 
lations to the students of perpetuity even by ever- 
lasting languages. 

" To be content that times to come should only 
know there was such a man, not caring whether they 
knew more of him, was a frigid ambition in Cardau; 
disparaging his horoscopal inclination and judgment of 
himself, who cares to subsist like Hippocrates' pa- 
tients, or Achilles' horses in Homer, under naked 
nominations, without deserts and noble acts, which 
are the balsams of our memories, the entelechia and 
soul of our subsistences. To be nameless in worthy 
deeds exceeds an infamous history. The Canaanitish 
woman lives more happily without a name than 
Herodias with one. And who had not rather been a 
good thief, than Pilate ? 

" But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her 
poppy and deals with the memory of men without 
distinction to merit or perpetuity ; who can but pity 



the founders of the Pyramids. Herostratus lives that 
burnt the temple of Diana ; he is almost lost that 
built it ; time has spared the epitaph of Adrian's 
horse ; confounded that of himself. In vain we 
compute our felicities by the advantage of our good 
names, since bad have equal durations ; and Ther- 
sites is like to live as long as Agamemnon without the 
favour of the everlasting register. Who knows 
whether the best of men be known ; or whether there 
be not more remarkable persons forgot than any that 
stand remembered in the known accounts of time. 
Without the favour of the everlasting register, the 
first man had been as unknown as the last, and 
Methuselah's long life had been his only chronicle. 

"Oblivion is not to be hired: the greatest part 
must be content to be as though they had not been; 
to be found in the register of God not in the record 
of man. Twenty-seven names make up the first story 
of the Flood; and the recorded names ever since con- 
tain not one living century. The number of the dead 
long exceedeth all that shall live. The night of time 
far surpasseth the. day, and who knows when was the 
equinox. Every hour adds unto that current arith- 
metic which scarce stands one moment. And since 
death must be the Lucina of life; and even pagans 
could doubt whether thus to live were to die; since 
our longest sun sets at right declension and makes 
but winter arches, and therefore it cannot be long 
before we lie down in darkness and have our light in 



22 

ashes; since the brother of death daily haunts us with 
dying mementos, and time, that grows old in itself, 
bids us hope no long duration; diuturnity is a dream 
and folly of expectation. 

" Darkness and light divide the course of time, 
and oblivion shares with memory a great part even of 
our living beings; we slightly remember our felicities, 
and the smartest strokes of affliction leave but short 
smart upon us. Sense endureth no extremities and 
sorrows destroy us or themselves. To weep into 
stones are fables. Afflictions induce callosities; 
miseries are slippery, or fall off like snow upon us, 
which, notwithstanding, is no unhappy stupidity. To 
be ignorant of evils to come and forgetful of evils 
past, is a merciful provision in nature, whereby we 
digest the mixture of our few and evil days; and our 
delivered senses are not relapsing into cutting remem- 
brances, our sorrows are not kept raw by the edge of 
repetitions. A great part of antiquity contented 
their hopes of subsistency with a transmigration of 
their soul — a good way to continue their memories, 
while, having the advantage of plural successions, 
they could not but act something remarkable in such 
variety of beings; and, enjoying the fame of their 
passed selves, make accumulation of glory unto their 
last duration. Others, rather than be lost in the 
uncomfortable night of nothing, were content to 
recede into the common being, and make one particle 
of the public soul of all things, which was no more 



— 23 — 
than to return into their unknown and divine original 
again. Egyptian ingenuity was more unsatisfied, 
contriving their bodies into sweet consistencies to 
attend the return of their souls. But all was vanity, 
feeding the mind and folly. The Egyptian mummies, 
which Cambyses or time hath spared, avarice now 
consumeth. Mummy is become merchandise; Miz- 
raim cures wounds, and Pharaoh is sold for balsams. 
* * * There is nothing strictly immortal but 
immortality. Whatever hath no beginning may 
be confident of no end, which is the peculiar of 
that necessary essence that cannot destroy itself, 
and the highest strain of omnipotency to be so 
powerfully constituted as not to suffer even from 
the power of itself; all others have a dependent 
being, and within the reach of destruction. But 
the sufficiency of Christian immortality frustrates 
all earthly glory, and the quality of either state 
after death makes a folly of posthumous memory. 
God, who can only destroy our souls and hath 
assured our resurrection, either of our bodies or 
names, hath directly promised no duration; wherein 
there is so much of chance that the boldest expect- 
ants have found unhappy frustration, and to hold 
long subsistence seems but a scape in oblivion. 
But man is a noble animal, splendid in ashes and 
pompous in the grave, solemnizing nativities and 
deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting ceremonies 
of bravery in the infamy of his nature. * * * 



— 2 4 — 

Pyramids, arches, obelisks were but the irregularities 
of vainglory, and wild enormities of ancient magnan- 
imity. But the most magnanimous resolution rests 
in the Christian religion, which trampleth upon pride 
and sits on the neck of ambition, humbly pursuing 
that infallible perpetuity unto which all others must 
diminish their diameters and be poorly seen in angles 
of contingency. Pious spirits, who passed their days 
in raptures of futurity, made little more of this world 
than the world that was before it, while they lay 
obscure in the chaos of pre-ordination and night of 
their fore-beings. And if any have been so happy as 
truly to understand Christian annihilation, ecstacies, 
evolution, liquefaction, transformation, the kiss of the 
spouse, gustation of God, and ingression into the 
divine shadow, they have already had a handsome 
anticipation of heaven; the glory of the world is 
surely over and the earth in ashes unto them. 

"To subsist in lasting monuments, to live in 
their productions, to exist in their names, and pre- 
dicament of chimeras was large satisfaction unto old 
expectations and made one part of their elysiums. 
But all this is nothing in the metaphysics of true be- 
lief. To live indeed is to be again ourselves, which, 
being not only a hope, but an evidence in noble be- 
lievers, 'tis all one to lie in St. Innocent's church-yard 
as in the sands of Egypt; ready to be anything in the 
ecstasy of being ever and as content with six foot as 
the moles of Adrianus." 



— 25 — 
"of myself. 

" For my life it is a miracle of thirty years, which 
to relate were not a history, but a piece of poetry, and 
would sound to common ears like a fable. For the 
world, I count it not an inn, but an hospital, and a 
place not to live in but to die in. The world that I 
regard is myself; it is the microcosm of my own 
frame that I can cast mine eye on — for the other, I 
use it but like my globe and turn it round sometimes 
for my recreation. * * * The earth is a point 
not only in respect of the heavens above us, but of 
that 'heavenly and celestial part within us. That 
mass of flesh that circumscribes me, limits not my 
mind. That surface that tells the heavens it hath an 
end, cannot persuade me I have any. * * * Whilst 
I study to find how I am a microcosm, or a little 
world, I find myself something more than the great. 
There is surely a piece of divinity in us — something 
that was before the heavens, and owes no homage 
unto the sun. Nature tells me I am the image of 
God as well as the Scripture. He that understands 
not thus much hath not his introduction or first lesson, 
and hath yet to begin the alphabet of man." 

Dr. Walter Charleton (1619-1707). — Phys- 
ician to Charles II, and for several terms President 
of the College of Physicians of London, and a friend 
of the greatest wits of his time, and writer of great 



— 26 — 

forcefulness and versatility, was Dr. Walter Charletoru 
Not only did he contribute to medical literature, but he 
wrote considerably on theology, physics, zoology, and 
antiquities. He also translated Epicurus' "Morals." 
He enjoyed great prosperity as a physician, and was 
honored by the profession as one of its most capable 
and representative members. Chambers says : " The 
work, however, which seems to deserve more particu- 
larly our attention in this place is ' A Brief Discourse 
Concerning the Different Wits of Men,' published by 
Dr. Charleton in 1675. It is interesting both on ac- 
count of lively and accurate sketches it contains, and 
because the author attributes the variety of talent 
which is found among men to difference of form, size, 
and qualities of their brains." I quote two extracts 
from this work. 

"the ready and nimble wit. 

" Such as are endowed wherewith have a certain 
extemporary acuteness of conceit, accompanied with 
a quick delivery of their thoughts, so as they can at 
pleasure entertain their auditors with facetious pass- 
ages and fluent discourses even upon slight occasions; 
but being generally impatient of second thoughts and 
deliberations, they seem fitter for pleasant colloquies 
and drollery than for counsel and design; like fly- 
boats, good only in fair weather and shallow waters, 
and then, too, more for pleasure than traffic. If they 
be, as for the most part they are, narrow in the 



— 27 — 

hold, and destitute of ballast sufficient to counter- 
poise their large sails, they reel with every blast of 
argument, and are often driven upon the sands of a 
' nonplus;' but where favoured with the breath of 
common applause, they sail smoothly and proudly, 
and, like the city pageants, discharge whole volleys 
of squibs and crackers, and skirmish most furiously. 
But take them from their familiar and private con- 
versation into grave and severe assemblies, whence 
all extemporary flashes of wit, all fantastic allusions, 
all personal reflections, are excluded, and there en- 
gage them in an encounter with solid wisdom, not in 
light skirmishes, but a pitched field of long and seri- 
ous debate concerning any important question, and 
then you shall soon discover their weakness, contemn 
that barrenness of understanding which is incapable 
of struggling with the difficulties of apodictical 
knowledge, and the deduction of truth from a long 
series of reasons. Again, if those very concise say- 
ings and lucky repartees, wherein they are so happy, 
and which at first hearing were entertained with so 
much of pleasure and admiration, be written down, 
and brought to a strict examination of their pertin- 
ency, coherence, and verity, how shallow, how frothy, 
how forced will they be found ! how much will they 
lose of that applause, which their tickling of the ear 
and present flight through the imagination had 
gained ! In the greatest part, therefore, of such men, 
you ought to expect no deep or continued river of 



— 28 - • 

wit, but only a few plashes, and those, too, not 
altogether free from mud and putrefaction." 

" THE SLOW BUT SURE WIT. 

" Some heads there are of a certain close and re- 
served constitution, which makes them at first sight 
to promise as little of the virtue wherein they are en- 
dowed, as the former appear to be above the imper- 
fections to which they are subject. Somewhat slow 
they are, indeed, of both conception and expression; 
yet no whit the less provided with solid prudence. 
When they are engaged to speak, their tongue doth 
not readily interpret the dictates of their mind, so 
that their language comes, as it were, dropping from 
their lips, even where they are encouraged by* 
familiar, or provoked by the smartness of jests, which 
sudden and nimble wits have newly darted at them. 
Costive they are also in invention; so that when they 
would deliver somewhat solid and remarkable, they 
are long in seeking what is fit, and as long in deter- 
mining in what manner and words to utter it. But 
after a little consideration, they penetrate deeply into 
the substance of things and marrow of business and 
conceive proper and emphatic words by which to ex- 
press their sentiments. Barren they are not, but a 
little heavy and retentive. Their gifts lie deep and 
concealed; but being furnished with notions, not airy 
and umbratil ones borrowed from the pedantism of 
the schools, but true and useful — and if they have 



— 2 9 — 

been manured with good learning, and the habit 
of exercising their pen — oftentimes they produce 
many excellent conceptions to be transmitted to 
posterity. Having, however, an aspect very like to 
narrow and dull capacities, at first sight most men 
take them to be really such, and strangers look upon 
them with the eyes of neglect and contempt. Hence it 
comes, that excellent parts remaining unknown, often 
want the favour and patronage of great persons, 
whereby they might be redeemed from obscurity, and 
raised to employments answerable to their faculties, 
and crowned with honours proportionate to their 
merits. The best course, therefore, for these to over- 
come that eclipse which prejudice usually brings upon 
them, is to contend against their own modesty, and 
either by frequent converse with noble and discerning 
spirits, to enlarge the windows of their minds, and 
dispel those clouds of reservedness that darken the 
lustre of their faculties; or by writing on some new 
and useful subject, to lay open their talent, so that 
the world may be convinced of their intrinsic value." 

Sir Samuel Garth (1670-1718). — One of the 
most scholarly gentlemen of the eighteenth century, 
and a physician of great distinction, was Sir Samuel 
Garth — the author of " The Dispensary," a poem em- 
bodying the keenest satire, and a production which is 
replete with all that makes poetry ornate. He was 
physician-in-ordinary to the king, and held many 



— 3° — 
honorable positions. He was the friend and crony of 
all the literary gentlemen of his time. There was 
much trouble in his day between the apothecaries 
and the physicians. The apothecaries wished to 
practice medicine as well as prepare prescriptions (a 
thing which in this day is not entirely unknown [!!!]), 
and a bitter war waged for a long time between the 
apothecaries and physicians. The most effective 
weapon brought into this war was Dr. Garth's poem, 
" The Dispensary." The apothecaries were for the 
time defeated, but later the House of Commons 
-decided they had a right to practice medicine. 
Garth's life was not a long one, and it was said he 
welcomed death as a dear friend who had brought 
the sweet boon of rest. He lived in an age noted for 
its dissoluteness, and it is said he was not free from 
the vices and follies then prevalent in fashionable 

life. 

I quote an extract from " The Dispensary," 
which will give the reader an idea of the style of his 
versification and beauty of his thoughts and the keen- 
ness of his satire. I give also another quotation from 
him, " On Death." 

EXTRACT FROM " THE DISPENSARY." 

Speak, goddess! since 'tis thou ,that best canst tell 
How ancient leagues to modern discord fell; 
And why physicians were so cautious grown 
Of others' lives, and lavish of their own; 
How by a journey to the Elysian plain 



— 3i — 

Peace triumphed, and old time returned again. 

Not far from that most celebrated place 
Where angry Justice shews her awful face; 
Where little villains must submit to fate 
That great ones may enjoy the world in state; 
There stands a dome, majestic to the sight, 
And sumptuous arches bear its oval height; 
A golden globe, placed high with artful skill, 
Seems, to the distant sight, a gilded pill; 
This pile was, by the pious patron's aim, 
Raised for a use as noble as its frame; 
Not did the learned society decline 
The propagation of that great design; 
In all her mazes, Nature's face they viewed, 
And, as she disappeared, their search pursued. 
Wrapt in the shade of night the goddess lies, 
Yet to the learned unveils her dark disguise, 
But shuns the gross access of vulgar eyes. 

Now she unfolds the faint and dawning strife 
Of infant atoms kindling into life; 
How ductile matter new meanders takes, 
And slender trains of twisting fibres makes; 
And how the viscous seeks a closer tone, 
By just degrees to harden into bone; 
While the more loose flow from the vital urn, 
And in full tides of purple streams return; 
How lambent flames from life's bright lamps arise, 
And dart in emanations through the eyes; 
How from each sluice a gentle torrent pours 
To slake a feverish heat with ambient showers; 
Whence their mechanic powers the spirits claim; 
How great their force, how delicate their frame; 
How the same nerves are fashioned to sustain 
The greatest pleasure and the greatest pain; 



_ 3 2 — 

Why bilious juice a golden light puts on, 
And floods of chyle in silver currents run; 
How the dim speck of entity began 
To extend its recent form and stretch to man; — 
Why Envy oft transforms with wan disguise, 
And why gay Mirth sits smiling in the eyes; — 
Whence Milo's vigour at the Olympics shewn, 
Whence tropes to Finch, or impudence to Sloane; 
How matter, by the varied shape of pores, 
Or idiots frames, or solemn senators. 

Hence 'tis we wait the wondrous cause to find, 
How body acts upon impassive mind; 
How fumes of wine the thinking part can fire, 
Past hopes revive, and present joys inspire; 
Why our complexions oft our souls declare, 
And how the passions in the features are; 
How touch and harmony arise between 
Corporeal figure and a form unseen; 
How quick their faculties the limbs fulfil, 
And act at every summons of the will; 
With mighty truths, mysterious to descry, 
Which in the womb of distant causes lie. 

But now no grand inquiries are descried; 
Mean faction reigns where knowledge should preside; 
Feuds are increased, and learning laid aside; 
Thus synods oft concern for faith conceal, 
And for important nothings shew a zeal: 
The drooping sciences neglected pine, 
And Paean's beams with fading lustre shine. 
No readers here with hectic looks are found, 
Nor eyes in rheum, through midnight watching drowned. 
The lonely edifice in sweats complains 
That nothing there but sullen silence reigns. 

This place, so fit for undisturbed repose, 



— 33 ~ 

The god of Sloth for his asylum chose; 
Upon a couch of down in these abodes, 
Supine with folded arms, he thoughtless nods; 
Indulging dreams his godhead lull to ease, 
With murmurs of soft rills, and whispering trees: 
The poppy and each numbing plant dispense 
Their drowsy virtue and dull indolence; 
No passions interrupt his easy reign, 
No problems puzzle his lethargic brain; 
But dark oblivion guards his peaceful bed, 
And lazy fogs hang lingering o'er his head. 

ON DEATH. 

'Tis to the vulgar death too harsh appears; 

The ill we feel is only in our fears. 

To die, is landing on some silent shore, 

Where billows never break, nor tempests roar; 

Ere well we feel the friendly stroke, 'tis o'er. 

The wise through thought the insults of death defy; 

The fools through blessed insensibility. 

'Tis what the guilty fear, the pious crave; 

Sought by the wretch and vanquished by the brave. 

It eases lovers, sets the captive free; 

And, though a tyrant, offers liberty. 

Sir Richard Blackmore (1658-1729). — Dr. 
Blackmore is not only a specimen of the literary man 
and physician, but an example of how one who possesses 
merit may, if he has not the friendship of those in 
power, be considered inferior. Those who hon- 
estly look into the matter must acknowledge that 
Dr. Blackmore was a true poet. Of course now his 
works are little read, and the subjects upon which he 

3 GGG 



— 34 — 

wrote now claim but little attention, yet one has only 
to look for the fire of poetry to find it in his produc- 
tions. 

He enjoyed greater popularity than any other 
physician of his particular day, and was knighted by 
William III., and made a censor of the College of 
Physicians. In 1695 there appeared under his name 
an epic entitled "Prince Arthur," which he wrote 
while riding in his carriage, going from the house of 
one patient to another. He was eminent for his piety, 
and is described by those of his contemporaries that 
did not hate him as in every respect a most lovable 
man. Dr. Johnson includes him in his edition of the 
British Poets. 

I quote an extract from " Creation," one of his 
chief works, which will give the reader some idea of 
his poetry: 

THE SCHEME OF CREATION. 

You ask us why the soil the thistle breeds; 
Why its spontaneous birth are thorns and weeds; 
Why for the harvest it the harrow needs ? 

The Author might a nobler world have made, 
In brighter dress the hills and vales arrayed, 
And all its face in flowery scenes displayed: 
The glebe untilled might plenteous crops have borne, 
And brought forth spicy groves instead of thorn: 
Rich fruit and flowers without the gardener's pains 
Might every hill have crowned, have honoured all the 

plains: 
This Nature might have boasted, had the Mind 



— 35 — 

Who formed the spacious universe designed 

That man, from labour free, as well as grief, 

Should pass in lazy luxury his life. 

But He his creature gave a fertile soil, 

Fertile, but not without the owner's toil, 

That some reward his industry should crown, 

And that his food in part might be his own. 

But while insulting you arraign the land, 

Ask why it wants the plough, or labourer's hand, 

Kind to the marble rocks you ne'er complain 

That they, without the sculptor's skill and pain, 

No perfect statue yield, no basse relieve, 

Or finished column for the palace give. 

Yet from the hills unlaboured figures came, 

Man might have ease enjoyed, though never fame. 

You may the world of more defect upbraid, 

That other works by Nature are unmade: 

That she did never, at her own expense, 

A palace rear, and in magnificence 

Out-rival art, to grace the stately rooms; 

That she no castle builds, no lofty domes. 

Had Nature's hand these various works prepared, 

What thoughtful care, what labour had been spared ! 

But then no realm would one great master shew, 

No Phidias Greece, and Rome no Angelo. 

With equal reason, too, you might demand 

Why boats and ships require the artist's hand; 

Why generous Nature did not these provide, 

To pass the standing lake or flowing tide. 

You say the hills, which high in air arise, 

Harbour in clouds, and mingle with the skies, 

That earth's dishonour and encumbering load, 

Of many spacious regions man defraud; 

For beasts and birds of prey a desolate abode, 



-36- 

But can the objector no convenience find 

In mountains, hills, and rocks, which gird and bind 

The mighty frame, that else would be disjoined ! 

Do not those heaps the raging tide restrain, 

And for the dome afford the marble vein ? 

Do not the rivers from the mountains flow, 

And bring down riches to the vale below ? 

See how the torrent rolls the golden sand 

From the mighty ridges to the flatter land ! 

The lofty lines abound with endless store 

Of mineral treasure and metallic ore. 

Dr. John Arbuthnot (1667-1735) was declared 
by Swift, and his contemporaries generally, to have 
been the most intellectual and humane man in the 
world. He was the intimate friend of Pope, Gay, 
Prior, Swift, and engaged with them in several liter- 
ary enterprises. He was the chief contributor to 
Martinus Scriblerus, and the author of "The His- 
tory of John Bull." He displayed his talents in 
other works, and was truly a poet. His " Know 
Yourself " is esteemed by the best judges to be the 
most philosophical poem in the English language. 
He was a member of the Royal Society, fellow of the 
Royal College of Surgeons, and physician to Queen 
Anne. He attained the greatest eminence in his pro- 
fession, and was the greatest example of his times of 
a union Of the literary man and physician. His med- 
ical productions exhibit the greatest profundity of 
research and observation. Shaw says: " He seems to 
have fully deserved the admiration lavished upon 



— 37 — 

him by all his friends, as an accomplished scholar, an 
able and benevolent physician, and a wit of singular 
brilliancy and fertility." The object of Martinus 
Scriblerus was to ridicule the false tastes then preva- 
lent. It is thought by many that object lessons were 
first suggested by this passage in Scriblerus: " The 
old gentleman so contrived it, to make everything 
contribute to the improvement of his knowledge, 
even to his very dress. He invented him a geograph- 
ical suit of clothes, which might give him hints of 
that science and likewise some knowledge of the com- 
merce of different nations. He had a French hat 
with an African feather, Holland shirts and Flanders 
lace, English cloth lined with Indian silk; his gloves 
were Italian, and his shoes were Spanish. He was 
made to observe this, and daily catechised thereupon, 
which his father was wont to call traveling at home." 
He never gave him a fig or an orange but he obliged 
him to give an account from what country it came. 
Presenting my readers with Dr. Arbuthnot's poem, 
u Know Yourself," will make it impossible to give 
more than a short specimen of his prose composition. 

" USEFULNESS OF MATHEMATICAL LEARNING. 

" The advantages which accrue to the mind by 
mathematical studies consist chiefly in these things: 
ist, In accustoming it to attention; 2nd, in giving it a 
habit of close and demonstrative reasoning; 3rd, in 
freeing it from prejudice, credulity, and superstition. 



-38- 

" First, the mathematics make the mind attentive 
to the objects which it considers. This they do by- 
entertaining it with a great variety of truths, which 
are delightful and evident, but not obvious. Truth is 
the same thing to the understanding as music to the 
ear and beauty to the eye. The pursuit of it does 
really as much gratify a natural faculty implanted in 
us by our wise Creator as the pleasing of our senses; 
only in the former case, as the object and faculty are 
more spiritual, the delight is the more pure and free 
from the regret, turpitude, lassitude, and intemper- 
ance that commonly attend sensual pleasures. The 
most part of other sciences consisting only of proba- 
ble reasonings, the mind has not where to fix, and, 
wanting sufficient principles to pursue his researches 
upon, gives them over as impossible. Again, as in 
mathematical investigations truth may be found, so it 
is not always obvious. This spurs the mind, and 
makes it diligent and attentive. 

" The second advantage which the mind reaps 
from mathematical knowledge is a habit of clear, de- 
monstrative, and methodical reasoning. We are con- 
trived by nature to learn by imitation more than by 
precept; and I believe in that respect reasoning is 
much like other inferior arts — as dancing, singing, 
etc.; — acquired by practice. By accustoming ourselves 
to reason closely about quantity, we acquire a habit 
of doing so in other things. Logical precepts are 
more useful, nay, they are absolutely necessary, for a 



— 39 — 
rule of formal arguing in public disputations, and 
confounding an obstinate and perverse adversary and 
exposing him to the audience or readers. But, in the 
search of truth, an imitation of the method of the 
geometers will carry a man further than all the dia- 
lectical rules. Their analysis is the proper model we 
ought to form ourselves upon, and imitate in the reg- 
ular disposition and progress of our inquiries; and 
even he who is ignorant of the nature of mathemati- 
cal analysis uses a method somewhat analogous to it. 
" Thirdly, mathematical analysis adds vigour to 
the mind, frees it from prejudice, credulity, and super- 
stition. This it does in two ways: ist, By accustom- 
ing us to examine, and not to take things upon trust; 
2nd, by giving us a clear and extensive knowledge of 
the system of the world, which, as it creates in us the 
most profound reverence of the almighty and wise 
Creator, so it frees us from the mean and narrow 
thoughts which ignorance and superstition are apt to 
beget. * * * The mathematics are friends to 
religion, inasmuch as they charm the passions, restrain 
the impetuosity of the imagination, and purge the 
mind from error and prejudice. Vice is error, con- 
fusion, and false reasoning; all truth is more or less 
opposed to it. Besides, mathematical studies may 
serve for a pleasant entertainment for those hours 
which young men are apt to throw away upon their 
vices; the delightfulness of them being such as to 
make solitude not only easy, but desirable." 



— 4° — 

KNOW YOURSELF! 

What am I ? how produced 2L and for what end ? 

Whence drew I being ? to what period tend ? 

Am I the abandon'd orphan of blind chance? 

Dropt by wild atoms in disorder'd dance? 

Or from an endless chain of causes wrought? 

And of unthinking substance born with thought : 

By motion which began without a cause, 

Supremely wise, without design or laws ? 

Am I but what I seem, mere flesh and blood ; 

A branching channel, with a mazy flood ? 

The purple stream that through my vessels glides, 

Dull and unconscious flows like common tides : 

The pipes through which the circling juices stray, 

Are not that thinking I, no more than they : 

This frame compacted with transcendent skill, 

Of moving joints obedient to my will, 

Nursed from the fruitful glebe, like yonder tree, 

Waxes and wastes ; I call it mine, not me : 

New matter still the mouldering mass sustains, 

The mansion changed, the tenant still remains : 

And from the fleeting stream, r'epair'd by food, 

Distinct, as is the swimmer from the flood. 

What am I then? Sure, of a nobler birth. 

By parents' right I own, as mother, earth ; 

But claim superior lineage by my Sire,. 

Who warm'd th' unthinking clod with heavenly fire 

Essence divine, with lifeless clay allay'd, 

By double nature, double instinct sway'd ; 

With look erect, I dart my longing eye, 

Seem wing'd to part, and gain my native sky ; 

I strive to mount, but strive, alas ! in vain, 

Tied to this massy globe with magic chain. 

Now with swift thought I range from pole to pole, 



— 41 — 

View worlds around their flaming centers roll : 

What steady powers their endless motions guide, 

Through the same trackless paths of boundless void! 

I trace the blazing comet's fiery trail, 

And weigh the whirling planets in a scale : 

These godlike thoughts, while eager I pursue 

Some glittering trifle offered to my view, 

A gnat, an insect of the meanest kind, 

Erase the new-born image from my mind; 

Some beastly wants, craving importunate, 

Vile as the grinning mastiff at my gate, 

Calls off from heavenly truth this reasoning me, 

And tells me, I'm a brute as much as he. 

If on sublimer wings of love and praise, 

My soul above the starry vault I raise, 

Lured by some vain conceit, or shameful lust, 

I flag, I drop, and flutter in the dust. 

The towering lark thus from her lofty strain 

Stoops to an emmet, or a barley grain. 

By adverse gusts of jarring instincts tost, 

I rove to one, now to the other coast ; 

To bliss unknown my lofty soul aspires, 

My lot unequal to my vast desires. 

As 'mongst the hinds a child of royal birth 

Finds his high pedigree by conscious worth ; 

So man, amongst his fellow brutes exposed. 

Sees he's a king, but 'tis a kind deposed : 

Pity him, beasts! you by no law confined, 

Are barr'd from devious paths by being blind ; 

Whilst man, though opening views of various ways. 

Confounded by the aid of knowledge strays ; 

Too weak to choose, yet choosing still in haste, 

One moment gives the pleasure and distaste ; 

Bilk'd by past minutes, while the present cloy, 



— 4 2 — 

The flattering future still must give the joy. 

Not happy, but amused upon the road, 

And (like you) thoughtless of his last abode, 

Whether next sun his being shall restrain 

To endless nothing, happiness, or pain. 

Around me, lo, the thinking, thoughtless crew, 

(Bewildered each) their different paths pursue ; 

Of them I ask the way ; the first replies, 

Thou art a god ; and sends me to the skies. 

Down on the turf (the next) thou two-legg'd beast, 

There fix thy lot, thy bliss, and endless rest. 

Between these wide extremes the length is such, 

I find I know too little or too much. 

"Almighty Power, by whose most wise command, 

Helpless, forlorn, uncertain here I stand; 

Take this faint glimmering of thyself away, 

Or break into my soul with perfect day !" 

This said, expanded lay the sacred text, 

The balm, the light, the guide of souls perplex'd: 

Thus the benighted traveller that strays 

Through doubtful paths, enjoys the morning rays; 

The nightly mist, and thick descending dew, 

Parting, unfold the fields, and vaulted blue. 

"O Truth divine! enlighten'd by thy ray, 

I grope and guess no more, but see my way; 

Thou clear'dst the secret of my high descent, 

And told me what those mystic tokens meant; 

Marks of my birth, which I had worn in vain, 

Too hard for worldly sages to explain. 

Zeno's were vain, vain Epicurus' schemes, 

Their systems false, delusive were their dreams; 

Unskill'd my two-fold nature to divide, 

One nursed my pleasure, and one nursed my pride. 

Those jarring truths which human art beguile, 

Thy sacred page thus bids me reconcile." 



— 43 — 

Offspring of God, no less thy pedigree, 

What thou once wert, art now, and still may be, 

Thy God alone can tell, alone decree; 

Faultless thou dropt from His unerring skill, 

With the bare power to sin, since free of will: 

Yet charge not with thy guilt His bounteous love, 

For who has power to walk, has power to rove: 

Who acts by force impell'd, can naught deserve; 

And wisdom short of infinite may swerve. 

Borne on thy new-imp'd wings, thou took'st thy flight, 

Left thy Creator, and the realms of light; 

Disdain'd his gentle precept to fulfil; 

And thought to grow a god by doing ill: 

Though by foul guilt thy heavenly form defaced, 

In nature chang'd, from happy mansions chased, 

Thou still retain'st some sparks of heavenly fire, 

Too faint to mount, yet restless to aspire; 

Angel enough to seek thy bliss again, 

And brute enough to make thy search in vain. 

The creatures now withdraw their kindly use, 

Some fly thee, some torment, and some seduce; 

Repast ill suited to such different guests, 

For what thy sense desires, thy soul distastes; 

Thy lust, thy curiosity, thy pride, 

Curb'd, or deferr'd, or balk'd, or gratified, 

Rage on, and make thee equally unbless'd, 

In what thou want'st, and what thou hast possess'd 

In vain thou hopest for bliss on this poor clod, 

Return, and seek thy Father, and thy God: 

Yet think not to regain thy native sky, 

Borne on wings of vain philosophy; 

Mysterious passage ! hid from human eyes; 

Soaring you'll sink, and sinking you will rise: 

Let humble thoughts thy wary footsteps guide, 

Regain by meekness what you lost by pride. 



— 44 — 
Mark Akenside (1721-1770). — One of the most 
amiable and most moral poets of the 18th century 
was Mark Akenside. He was born of humble par- 
entage, his father being a butcher. In early life he 
received an injury which rendered him a cripple for 
life. He received his medical education at Leyden, 
taking the degree of M.D. there in 1774. His 
" Pleasures of Imagination " is one of the most ornate 
productions in our language. His many poems are 
of high order, and have had great admirers from their 
first appearance to the present moment. He prac- 
ticed medicine with varying success, and was a medi- 
cal writer also of celebrity, having contributed to the 
current medical literature of his time. The life of 
Akenside was one which will be read with great inter- 
est by all lovers of poetry. 

PATRIOTISM. 

Mind, mind alone — bear witness, earth and heaven! — 

The living fountains in itself contains 

Of beauteous and sublime; here hand in hand 

Sit paramount the Graces; here enthroned, 

Celestial Venus, with divinest airs, 

Invites the soul to never-fading joy. 

Look, then, abroad through nature, to the range 

Of planets, suns, and adamantine spheres, 

Wheeling unshaken through the void immense; 

And speak, O man! does this capacious scene 

With half that kindling majesty dilate 

Thy strong conception, as when Brutus rose 

Refulgent from the stroke of Caesar's fate, 



- 45 — 

Amid the crowd of patriots; and his arm 

Aloft extending, like eternal Jove 

When guilt brings down the thunder, called aloud 

On Tully's name, and shook his Crimson steel, 

And bid the father of his country, hail! 

For lo! the tyrant prostrate on the dust, 

And Rome again is free! Is aught so fair 

In all the dewy landscapes of the spring, 

In the bright eyes of Hesper, or the morn, 

And Nature's fairest forms, is aught so fair 

As virtue's friendship ? As the candid blush 

Of him who strives with fortune to be just ? 

The graceful tear that streams for others' woes, 

Or the mild majesty of private life, 

Where Peace, with ever-blooming olive, crowns 

The gate; where Honour's liberal hands effuse 

Unenvied treasures, and the snowy wings 

Of Innocence and Love protect the scene. 

INSCRIPTION FOR A MONUMENT TO SHAKESPEARE. 

O youth and virgins: O declining eld. 
O pale misfortune's slaves: O ye who dwell 
Unknown with humble quiet: ye who wait 
In courts, or fill the golden seat of kings: 
O sons of sport and pleasure: O thou wretch 
That weep'st for jealous love, or the sore wounds 
Of conscious guilt, or death's rapacious hand, 
Which left thee void of hope: O ye who roam 
In exile, ye who through the embattled field 
Seek bright renown, or who for noblier palms 
Contend, the leaders of a public cause, 
Approach: behold this marble. Know ye not 
The features ? Hath not oft his faithful tongue 
Told you the fashion of your own estate, 



- 46 - 

The secrets of your bosom ? Here then round 
His monument with reverence while ye stand, 
Say to each other: 'This was Shakespeare's form; 
Who walked in every path of human life, 
Felt every passion; and to all mankind 
Doth now, will ever that experience yield 
Which his own genius only could acquire.' 

INSCRIPTION FOR A STATUE OF CHAUCER AT 
WOODSTOCK. 

Such was old Chaucer: such the placid mien 

Of him who first with harmony informed 

The language of our fathers. Here he dwelt 

For many a cheerful day. These ancient walls 

Have often heard him, while his legends blithe 

He sang; of love or knighthood, or the wiles 

Of homely life; through each estate and age, 

The fashions and follies of the world 

With cunning hand portraying. Though perchance 

From Blenheim's towers, O stranger, thou art come 

Glowing with Churchill's trophies; yet in vain 

Dost thou applaud them, if thy breast be cold 

To him, this other hero; who in times 

Dark and untaught, began with charming verse 

To tame the rudeness of his native land. 



Tobias George Smollett (1721-1771). — The im- 
mortal author of " Roderick Random " and " Peregrine 
Pickle," and busy litterateur, Dr. Smollett, was one of 
the most indefatigable workers in the whole realm of 
English literary men. He translated " Don Quixote," 
" Gil Bias," and other works into English. He en- 



— 47 — 

countered many adventures in his life, having to strive 
against poverty and an imperious temper. He prac- 
ticed medicine with indifferent success, yet it afforded 
him "a staff," and it is to be believed he loved the 
medical profession and that his studies had done 
much to enlarge his scope of observation and to store 
his mind with useful knowledge. I shall make no 
quotation from his prose productions, but refer my 
readers to " Roderick Random," which has for a cen- 
tury been recognized as one of the greatest English 
novels. I quote below some of his verses: 

ODE TO INDEPENDENCE. 

Strophe. 

Thy spirit, Independence, let me share, 

Lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye; 
Thy steps I follow, with my bosom bare, 

Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky ! 
Deep in the frozen regions of the north, 
A goddess violated brought thee forth, 
Immortal Liberty, whose look sublime 
Hath bleached the tyrant's cheek in every varying clime, 
What time the iron-hearted Gaul, 

With frantic superstition for his guide, 
Armed with the dagger and the pall, 

The sons of Woden to the field defied: 
The ruthless hag, by Weser's flood, 

In Heaven's name urged the infernal blow; 

And red the stream began to flow: 
The vanquished were baptised with blood ! 



Antistrophe.. 

The Saxon Prince in horror fled 

From altars stained with human gore, 
And Liberty his routed legions led 

In safety to the bleak Norwegian shore. 
There in a cave asleep she lay, 

Lulled by the hoarse-resounding main, 
When a bold savage passed that way. 

Impelled by destiny, his name Disdain. 
Of ample front the portly chief appeared: 

The hunted bear supplied a shaggy vest; 
The drifted snow hung on his yellow beard, 

And his broad shoulders braved the furious blast. 
He stopt; he gazed; his bosom glowed, 

And deeply felt the impression of her charms: 
He seized the advantage Fate allowed, 

And straight compressed her in his vigorous arms. 

Strophe. 

The curlew screamed, the tritons blew 

Their shells to celebrate the ravished rite; 
Old Time exulted as he flew; 

And Independence saw the light. 
The light he saw in Albion's happy plains, 

Where under cover of a flowering thorn, 
While Philomel renewed her warbled strains, 

The auspicious fruit of stolen embrace was born. 
The mountain Dryads seized with joy 

The smiling infant to their charge consigned; 
The Doric muse caressed the favourite boy; 

The hermit Wisdom stored his opening mind. 



— 49 — 

As rolling years matured his age, 

He flourished bold and sinewy as his sire; 

While the mild passions in his breast assuage 
The fiercer flames of his maternal fire. 

Antistrophe. 

Accomplished thus, he winged his way, 

And zealous roamed from pole to pole, 
The rolls of right eternal to display, 

And warm with patriot thought the aspiring soul. 
On desert isles 'twas he that raised 

Those spires that gild the Adriatic wave, 
Where tyranny beheld amazed 

Fair Freedom's temple, where he marked her grave. 
He steeled the blunt Batavian's arms 

To burst the Iberian's double chain; 
And cities reared, and planted farms, 

Won from the skirts of Neptune's wide domain. 
He with the generous rustics sate 

On Uri's rocks in close divan; 
And winged that arrow sure as fate, 

Which ascertained the sacred rights of man. 

Strophe. 

Arabia's scorching sands he crossed, 

Where blasted nature pants supine, 
Conductor of her tribes adust 

To freedom's adamantine shrine ; 
And many a Tartar horde forlorn, aghast! 

He snatched from under fell Oppression's wing, 
And taught amidst the dreary waste 

The all-cheering hymns of liberty to sing. 
He virtue finds, like precious ore, 

Diffused through every baser mould; 

4 GGG 



— 50 — 

Even now he stands on Calvi's rocky shore, 
And turns the dross of Corsica to gold : 

He, guardian genius, taught my youth 
Pomp's tinsel livery to despise; 

My lips, by him chastised to truth, 
Ne'er paid that homage which my heart denies. 

Antistrophe. 

Those sculptured halls my feet shall never tread , 

Where varnished vice and vanity combined 
To dazzle and seduce, with banners spread, 

And forge vile shackles for the free-born mind. 
While Insolence his wrinkled front uprears, 

And all the flowers of spurious fancy blow ; 
And Title his ill-woven chaplet wears, 

Full often wreathed around the miscreant's brow. 
Where ever-dimpling Falsehood, pert and vain, 

Presents her cup of stale profession's froth; 
And pale Disease, with all his bloated train, 

Torments the sons of gluttony and sloth. 

Strophe. 

In Fortune's car behold that minion ride, 

With either India's glittering spoils oppressed; 
So moves the sumpter-mule in harnessed pride, 

That bears the treasure which he cannot taste. 
For him let venal bards disgrace the bay, 

And hireling minstrels wake the tinkling string ; 
Her sensual snares let faithless pleasure lay, 

And jingling bells fantastic folly ring : 
Disquiet, doubt, and dread shall intervene ; 

And nature, still to all her feelings just, 
In vengeance hang a damp on every scene, 

Shook from the baleful pinions of disgust. 



— 5i — 
Antistrophe. 

Nature I'll court in her sequestered haunts, 

By mountain, meadow, streamlet, grove, or cell ; 
Where the poised lark his evening ditty chants, 

And health, and peace, and contemplation dwell. 
There, study shall with solitude recline, 

And friendship pledge me to his fellow-swains, 
And toil and temperance sedately twine 

The slender cord that fluttering life sustains ; 
And fearless poverty shall guard the door, 

And taste unspoiled the frugal table spread, 
And industry supply the humble store, 

And sleep unbribed his dews refreshing shed ; 
White-mantled Innocence, ethereal sprite, 

Shall chase far off the goblins of the night : 
And Independence o'er the day preside, 

Propitious power ! my patron and my pride. 

John Armstrong (1709-1779). — One of the 
most happy examples of the literary physician pre- 
sented to us in the gallery of the eighteenth century 
is certainly that of John Armstrong. He attained 
great proficiency in the medical sciences, and dis- 
tinguished himself as a poet whose name will always 
shine with splendor on Fame's fair temple. His first 
poetical production, while it glowed with all the 
effulgence and contained the very essence of true 
poetic inspiration, was not well received on account 
of the occasional immoral extremes into which his 
muse was led. Later he wrote two other poems — 
''Benevolence " and " Taste." I think, however, his 



— 52 — 

" Art of Preserving Health " will continue to be re- 
garded as his best work. From a precarious income 
Dr. Armstrong managed to leave the sum of $15,000. 
I wish I could give many quotations from this bard, 
whose poems can be read with such pleasure and 
profit, but I can only give a few. 

OVER-INDULGENCE IN WINE. 

But, most too passive, when the blood runs low, 

Too weakly indolent to strive with pain 

And bravely by resisting conquer fate, 

Try Circe's arts; and in the tempting bowl 

Of poisoned nectar sweet oblivion swill. 

Struck by the powerful charm, the gloom dissolves 

In empty air; Elysium opens round, 

A pleasing frenzy buoys the lightened soul, 

And sanguine hopes dispel your fleeting care; 

And what was difficult, and what was dire, 

Yields to your prowess and superior stars: 

The happiest you of all that e'er were mad, 

Or are, or shall be, could this folly last. 

But soon your heaven is gone; a heavier gloom 

Shuts o'er your head; and, as the thundering stream, 

Swollen o'er its banks with sudden mountain rain, 

Sinks from its tumult to a silent brook, 

So, when the frantic raptures in your breast 

Subside, you languish into mortal man; 

You sleep, and waking find yourself undone, 

For, prodigal of life, in one rash night 

You lavished more than might support three days. 

A heavy morning comes; your cares return 

With tenfold rage. An anxious stomach well 

May be endured; so may the throbbing head; 



— 53 — 

But such a dim delirium, such a dream, 
Involves you, such a dastardly despair 
Unmans your soul, as maddening Plentheus felt, 
When, baited round Cithaeron's cruel sides. 
He saw two suns, and double Thebes, ascend. 

PESTILENCE OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. 

Ere yet the fell Plantagenets had spent 
Their ancient rage at Bosworth's purple field; 
While, for which tyrant England should receive, 
Her legions in incestuous murders mixed 
And daily horrors; till the fates were drunk 
With kindred blood by kindred hands prof used: 
Another plague of more gigantic arm 
Arose ; a monster never known before 
Reared from Cocytus its portentous head; 
This rapid fury not, like other pests, 
Pursued a gradual course, but in a day 
Rushed as a storm o'er half the astonished isle, 
And strewed with sudden carcasses the land. 

First through the shoulders, or whatever part 
Was seized the first, a fervid vapour sprung; 
With rash combustion thence, the quivering spark 
Shot to the heart and kindled all within; 
And soon the surface caught the spreading fires. 
Through all the yielding pores the melted blood 
Gushed out in smoky sweats; but naught assuaged 
The torrid heat within, nor aught relieved 
The stomach's anguish. With incessant toil, 
Desperate of ease, impatient of their pain, 
They tossed from side to side. In vain the stream 
Ran full and clear; they burnt, and thirsted still. 
The restless arteries with rapid blood 
Beat strong and frequent. Thick and pantingly 



— 54 — 

The breath was fetched, and with huge labourings heaved. 

At last a heavy pain oppressed the head, 

A wild delirium came; their weeping friends 

Were strangers now, and this no home of theirs. 

Harassed with toil on toil, the sinking powers 

Lay prostrate and o'erthrown; a ponderous sleep 

Wrapt all the senses up: they slept and died. 

In some a gentle horror crept at first 
O'er all the limbs; the sluices of the skin 
Withheld their moisture, till by art provoked 
The sweats o'erfiowed, but in a clammy tide; 
Now free and copious, now restrained and slow; 
Of tinctures various, as the temperature 
Had mixed the blood, and rank with fetid streams, 
As if the pent-up humours by delay 
Were grown more fell, more putrid, and malign. 
Here lay their hopes (though little hope remained), 
With full effusion of perpetual sweats 
To drive the venom out. And here the fates 
Were kind, that long they lingered not in pain; 
For, who survived the sun's diurnal race 
Rose from the dreary gates of hell redeemed; 
Some the sixth hour oppressed, and some the third. 
Of many thousands, few untainted 'scaped; 
Of those infected, fewer 'scaped alive; 
Of those who lived, some felt a second blow; 
And whom the second spared, a third destroyed. 
Frantic with fear, they sought by flight to shun 
The fierce contagion. O'er the mournful land 
The infected city poured her hurrying swarms: 
Roused by the flames that fired her seats around, 
The infected country rushed into the town. 
Some "sad at home, and in the desert some, 
Abjured the fatal commerce of mankind. 



— 55 — 

In vain; where'er they fled, the fates pursued. 

Others, with hopes more specious, crossed the main, 

To seek protection 'neath far-distant skies, 

But none they found. It seemed the general air, 

From pole to pole, from Atlas to the east, 

Was then at enmity with English blood; 

For, but the race of England, all were safe 

In foreign climes; nor did this fury taste 

The foreign blood which England then contained. 

Where should they fly? The circumambient heaven 

Involved them still, and every breeze was bane. 

Where find relief? The salutary art 

Was mute, and, startled at the new disease, 

In fearful whispers hopeless omens gave. 

To Heaven with suppliant rites they sent their prayers; 

Heaven heard them not. Of every hope deprived, 

Fatigued with vain resources, and subdued 

With woes resistless, and enfeebling fear, 

Passive they sunk beneath the mighty blow. 

Nothing but lamentable sounds were heard, 

Nor aught was seen but ghastly views of death. 

Infectious horror ran from face to face, 

And pale despair. 'Twas all the business then 

To tend the sick, and in their turn to die. 

In heaps they fell; and oft the bed, they say, 

The sickening, dying, and the dead contained. 

Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774). — One of the 
most agreeable and general writers and one of the 
best of the British poets was Oliver Goldsmith. He 
cared nothing for money, and his life is one which 
can be read with the greatest interest, for he was not 
only a man of the highest order of genius, but one 



- 56 - 

who cared nothing for the morrow and one who had 
a " heart for any fate." He studied medicine, and, 
while he made literature his life's work, he frequently- 
practiced his profession. The list of his productions 
would be long, as many of them were written accord- 
ing to contract for booksellers; they would add noth- 
ing to his glory if mentioned. His " Animated 
Nature " was written to supply the demand which 
some bookseller had for a work on natural history, 
and so were many other of his works. His fame, 
however, if trusted only to his great novel, " The 
Vicar of Wakefield," and only two of his many 
poems, "The Deserted Village" and "The Travel- 
ler," would be as lasting as the " eternal hills." 

The poems of Goldsmith are so familiar that I 
shall quote only a few: 

EXTRACTS FROM " THE TRAVELLER." 

Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow, 
Or by the lazy Scheld, or wandering Po; 
Or onward, where the rude Corinthian boor 
Against the houseless stranger shuts the door; 
Or where Campania's plain forsaken lies, 
A weary waste expanding to the skies; 
Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see, 
My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee; 
********** 

But me not destined such delights to share, 
My prime of life in wandering spent and care; 
Impelled with steps unceasing to pursue 
Some fleeting good, that mocks me with the view; 



— 57 — 

That, like the circle bounding earth and skies, 

Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies; 

My fortune leads to traverse realms alone, 

And find no spot of all the world my own. 

Ev'n now, where Alpine solitudes ascend, 

I sit me down a pensive hour to spend; 

And, placed on high above the storm's career, 

Look downward where an hundred realms appear; 

Lakes, forests, cities, plains extending wide, 

The pomp of kings, the shepherd's humbler pride. 

When thus creation's charms around combine, 

Amidst the store should thankless pride repine? 

Say, should the philosophic mind disdain 

That good which makes each humbler bosom vain ? 

Let school-taught pride dissemble all it can, 

These little things are great to little man; 

And wiser he, whose sympathetic mind 

Exults in all the good of all mankind. 

Ye glittering towns, with wealth and. splendour crowned, 

Ye fields, where summer spreads profusion round; 

Ye lakes, whose vessels catch the busy gale; 

Ye bending swains, that dress the flowery vale; 

For me your tributary stores combine: 

Creation's heir, the world, the world is mine ! 

Dr. Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802). — This 
gentleman was one of the most distinguished and 
scholarly physicians of his time. He was a great and 
ardent lover of nature. He loved and cultivated 
botany. His home was picturesque and in all re- 
spects the abode of a poet. He feared that to pub- 
lish his poems would injure his practice. A second 
marriage added $3,000 to his income, and he began 



- 58 - 

to indulge his poetic desires, and to give to the world 
those divine thoughts and conceits which fill the 
reader of his poems with such rapture. The follow- 
ing quotations will serve to give the reader an idea of 
the beauty and field of his poetical work: 

INVOCATION TO THE GODDESS OF BOTANY. 

[From the "Botanic Garden."] 

Stay your rude steps ! whose throbbing breasts infold 
The legion-fiends of glory and of gold ! 
Stay, whose false lips seductive simpers part, 
While cunning nestles in the harlot heart ! 
For you no dryads dress the roseate bower, 
For you nO nymphs their sparkling vases pour; 
Unmarked by you, light graces swim the green, 
And hovering Cupids aim their shafts unseen. 

But thou whose mind the well attempered ray 
Of taste and virtue lights with purer day; 
Whose finer sense the soft vibration owns 
With sweet responsive sympathy of tones — 
So the fair flower expands its lucid form 
To meet the sun, and shuts it to the storm — 
For thee my borders nurse the fragrant wreath, 
My fountains murmur, and my zephyrs breathe; 
Slow slides the painted snail, the gilded fly 
Smooths his fine down, to charm thy curious eye; 
On twinkling fins my pearly pinions play, 
Or win with sinuous train their trackless way; 
My plumy pairs, in gay embroidery dressed, 
Form with ingenious bill the pensile nest, 
To love's sweet notes attune the listening dell, 
And Echo sounds her soft symphonious shell. 

And if with thee some hapless maid should stray, 



— 59 — 

Disastrous love companion of her way, 

Oh, lead her timid steps to yonder glade, 

Whose arching cliffs depending alders shade; 

Where, as meek evening wakes her temperate breeze, 

And moonbeams glitter through the trembling trees, 

The rills that gurgle round shall soothe her ear, 

The weeping rocks shall number tear for tear; 

There, as sad Philomel, alike forlorn, 

Sings to the night from her accustomed thorn 

While at sweet intervals each falling note 

Sighs with the gale and whispers round the grot, 

The sister woe shall calm her aching breast, 

And softer slumbers steal her cares to rest. 

Winds of the north ! restrain your icy gales, 
Nor chill the bosom of these happy vales ! 
Hence in dark heaps, ye gathering clouds, revolve ! 
Disperse, ye lightnings! and ye mists, dissolve ! 
Hither, emerging from yon orient skies, 
Botanic goddess, lend thy radiant eyes; 
O'er these soft scenes assume thy gentle reign, 
Pomona, Ceres, Flora in thy train; 
O'er the still dawn thy placid smile effuse, 
And with thy silver sandals print the dews; 
In noon's bright blaze thy vermeil vest unfold, 
And wave thy emerald banner starred with gold. 
Thus spoke the genius as he stept along, 
And bade these lawns to peace and truth belong; 
Down the steep slopes he led with modest skill 
The willing pathway and the truant rill; 
Stretched o'er the marshy vale yon willowy mound, 
Where shines the lake amid the tufted ground; 
Raised the young woodlands, smoothed the wary green, 
And gave to beauty all the quiet scene. 
She comes ! the goddess ! Through the whispering air, 



— 6o — 

Bright as the morn descends her blushing car; 
Each circling wheel a wreath of flowers entwines, 
And, gemmed with flowers, the silken harness shines; 
The golden bits with flowery studs are decked, 
And knots of flowers the crimson reins connect. 
And now on earth the silver axle rings, 
And the shell sinks upon its slender springs; 
Light from her airy seat the goddess bounds, 
And steps celestial press the pansied grounds. 
Fair Spring advancing calls her feathered quire, 
And tunes to softer notes her laughing lyre; 
Bids her gay hours on purple pinions move, 
And arms her zephyrs with the shafts of love. 

DEATH OF ELIZA AT THE BATTLE OF MINDEN. 

\From the "Loves of the Plants. ,"] 

Now stood Eliza on the wood-crowned height, 
O'er Minden's plain, spectatress of the fight; 
Sought with bold eye amid the bloody strife 
Her dearer self, the partner of her life; 
From hill to hill the rushing host pursued, 
And viewed his banner, or believed she viewed. 
Pleased with the distant roar, with quicker tread, 
Fast by his hand one lisping boy she led; 
And one fair girl amid the loud alarm 
Slept on her kerchief, cradled by her arm; 
While round her brows bright beams of Honor dart, 
And Love's warm eddies circle round her heart. 
Near and more near the intrepid beauty pressed, 
Saw through the driving smoke his dancing crest; 
Saw on his helm her virgin hands inwove, 
Bright stars of gold, and mystic knots of love; 
Heard the exulting shout, " They run ! they run ! " 



— 6i — 

"Great God ! " she cried, " he's safe ! the battle's won !" 
A ball now hisses through the airy tides — 
Some fury winged it, and some demon guides ! — 
Parts the fine locks her graceful head that deck, 
Wounds her fair ear, and sinks into her neck; 
The red stream, issuing from her azure veins, 
Dyes her white veil, her ivory bosom stains. 
"Ah me !" she cried, and sinking on the ground, 
Kissed her dear babes, regardless of the wound; 
"O cease not yet to beat, thou vital urn ! 
Wait, gushing life, O wait my love's return !" 
Hoarse barks the wolf, the vulture screams from far; 
The angel Pity shuns the walks of war ! 
"O spare, ye war-hounds, spare their tender age; 
On me, on me," she cried, " exhaust your rage ! " 
Then with weak arms her weeping babes'caressed, 
And, sighing, hid them in her blood-stained vest. 

From tent to tent the impatient warrior flies, 
Fear in his heart and frenzy in his eyes; 
Eliza's name along the camp he calls, 
" Eliza ! " echoes through the canvas walls; 
Quick through the murmuring gloom his footsteps tread 
O'er groaning heaps, the dying and the dead, 
Vault o'er the plain, and in the tangled wood — 
Lo ! dead Eliza weltering in her blood ! 
Soon hears his listening son the welcome sounds; 
With open arms and sparkling eye he bounds: 
"Speak low," he cries, and gives his little hand, 
" Mamma's asleep upon the dew-cold sand." 
Poor weeping babe, with bloody fingers pressed, 
And tried with pouting lips her milkless breast: 
" Alas ! we both with cold and hunger quake — 
Why do you weep ? Mamma will soon awake." 
" She'll wake no more !" the hapless mourner cried, 



— 62 — 

Upturned his eyes, and clasped his hands, and sighed; 
Stretched on the ground, awhile entranced he lay, 
And pressed warm kisses on the lifeless clay; 
And then upsprung with wild convulsive start, 
And all the father kindled in his heart; 
" O heavens! " he cried, " my first rash vow forgive; 
These bind to earth, for these I pray to live ! " 
Round his chill babes he wrapped his crimson vest, 
And clasped them sobbing to his aching breast. 

SONG TO ECHO. 

Sweet echo ! sleeps thy vocal shell, 
Where this high arch o'erhangs the dell; 
While Tweed, with sun-reflecting streams, 
Checkers thy rocks with dancing beams. 

Here may no clamours harsh intrude, 
No brawling hound or clarion rude; 
Here no fell beast of midnight prowl, 
And teach thy tortured cliffs to howl. 

Be thine to pour these vales along 
Some artless shepherd's evening song; 
While night's sweet bird from yon high spray 
Responsive listens to his lay. 

And if, like me, some love-lorn maid 
Should sing her sorrows to the shade, 
Oh ! soothe her breast, ye rocks around, 
With softest sympathy of sound. 

Dr. John Wolcot (1738-1819). — Dr. John 
Wolcot was one of those peculiar satirical figures who 
used their poetical powers to add sharpness to their 
lance, and to laugh at the follies of the world. His 



- 6 3 - 

line of poetry covers all the men and manners of his 
time. He seems to have been only happy when some 
act of folly or some absurd incident gave him an 
opportunity to write satirically — the fact that the 
King found a louse in his plate and ordered the 
heads of all the waiters shaved was a precious piece 
of news which he turned into a poem at which all 
England, save those interested, shook their sides. He 
does not seem to have prospered as a practitioner of 
medicine, and his poems, in the very nature of the 
•case, could not live long. They were " modern 
instances," or comments on passing incidents, and of 
course must soon lose their favor when new things 
and new comments are come. 

THE PILGRIMS AND THE PEAS. 

A brace of sinners, for no good, 
Were ordered to the Virgin Mary's shrine, 
Who at Loretto dwelt in wax, stone, wood, 
And in a curled white wig looked wondrous fine. 

Fifty long miles had these sad rogues to travel, 

With something in their shoes much worse than gravel; 

In short, their toes so gentle to amuse, 

The priest had ordered peas into their shoes. 

A nostrum famous in old popish times 
For purifying souls that stunk with crimes. 
A sort of apostolic salt, 
That popish parsons for its powers exalt, 
For keeping souls of sinners sweet, 
Just as our kitchen salt keeps meat. 



- 64 - 

The knaves set off on the same day, 

Peas in their shoes, to go and pray; 

But very different was their speed, I wot. 

One of the sinners galloped on, 

Light as a bullet from a gun; 

The other limped as if he had been shot. 

One saw the Virgin, soon Peccavi cried; 

Had his soul whitewashed all so clever, 

When home again he nimbly hied, 

Made fit with saints above to live forever. 

In coming back, however, let me say, 

He met his brother rogue about half-way, 

Hobbling with outstretched hams and bending knees,. 

Cursing the souls and bodies of the peas; 

His eyes in tears, his cheeks and brow in sweat, 

Deep sympathizing with his groaning feet. 

" How now! " the light-toed, whitewashed pilgrim broke, 

" You lazy lubber! " 

" Confound it! " cried t'other, " 'tis no joke; 

My feet, once hard as any rock, 

Are now as soft as blubber. — 

Excuse me, Virgin Mary, that I swear; 

As for Loretto, I shall not get there; 

No! to the Devil my sinful soul must go, 

For hang me if I ha'n't lost every toe! 

" But, brother sinner, do explain 

How 'tis that you are not in pain; 

What power hath worked a wonder for your toes — 

Whilst I, just like a snail, am crawling, 

Now swearing, now on saints devoutly bawling, 

Whilst not a rascal comes to ease my woes ? 



- 65 - 

" How is't that you can like a greyhound go, 

Merry as if naught had happened, burn ye?" 

" Why," cried the other, grinning, " you must know 

That just before I ventured on my journey, 

To walk a little more at ease, 

I took the liberty to boil my peas." 

THE APPLE DUMPLING AND A KING. 

Once on a time, a monarch, tired with whooping, 
Whipping and spurring, 
Happy in worrying 
A poor defenceless harmless buck — 
The horse and rider wet as muck — 
From his high consequence and wisdom stooping 
Entered through curiosity a cot, 
Where sat a poor old woman and her pot. 

The wrinkled, blear-eyed, good old granny 
In this same cot, illumed by many a cranny, 
Had finished apple dumpling for her pot; 
In tempting row the naked dumplings lay, 
When lo! the monarch, in his usual way, 
Like lightning spoke: " What's this ? — What's this ? — 
What, what?" 

Then, taking up a dumpling in his hand, 

His eyes with admiration did expand; 

And oft did majesty the dumpling grapple; 

At length, his curiosity aroused, he cried: 

" 'Tis monstrous, monstrous hard indeed! 

What makes it, pray, so hard?" The dame replied, 

Low curtsying: " Please, your majesty, the apple." 

5 GGG 



— 66 — 

" Very astonishing, indeed! Strange thing! " — 

Turning the dumpling round — rejoined the king. 

" Tis most extraordinary, then, all this is — 

It beats Pinette's conjuring all to pieces. 

Strange I should never of a dumpling dream! 

But, goody, tell me where — where — where's the seam?' 

" Sir, there's no seam," quoth she; "I never knew 
That folks did apple dumplings sew." 
" No ? " cried the staring monarch, with a grin: 
" How, how the devil got the apple in ? " 

On which the dame the curious scheme revealed 
By which the apple lay so sly concealed, 
Which made the Solomon of Britain start; 
Who to the palace with full speed repaired 
And queen and princesses so beauteous scared, 
All with the wonders of the dumpling art. 

There did he labour one whole week to shew 
The wisdom of an apple dumpling maker; 

And, lo! so deep was majesty in dough 
The palace seemed the lodging of a baker! 



George Crabbe (1754-1832). — George Crabbe 
was apprenticed to a surgeon in early life, and learned 
the medical sciences. Although he abandoned medi- 
cine, and followed literature and the life of a clergy- 
man, he wrote much against quackery, and showed in 
all things that his first love, medicine, was dear to his 
heart. 

The following extracts from his poems will give 
the reader an idea of his poetical work: 



- 67 - 

THE PARISH WORKHOUSE AND APOTHECARY. 

\_From " The Village"} 

There, in yon house that holds the parish poor, 
Whose walls of mud scarce bear the broken door; 
There, where the putrid vapours, flagging, play, 
And the dull wheel hums doleful through the day; 
There children dwell who know no parents' care; 
Parents, who know no children's love, dwell there; 
Heart-broken matrons on their joyless bed, 
Forsaken wives, and mothers never wed; 
Dejected widows with unheeded tears, 
And crippled age with more than childhood's fears; 
The lame, the blind, and — far the happiest they ! — 
The moping idiot and the madman gay. 

Here, too, the sick their final doom receive, 
Here brought, amid the scenes of grief to grieve, 
"Where the loud groans from some sad chamber flow, 
Mixed with the clamours of the crowd below; 
Here sorrowing, they each kindred sorrow scan, 
And the cold charities of man to man — 
Whose laws indeed for ruined age provide, 
And strong compulsion plucks the scrap from pride; 
But still that scrap is bought with many a sigh, 
And pride embitters what it can't deny. 
Say ye, oppressed by some fantastic woes, 
Some jarring nerve that baffles your repose; 
Who press the downy couch, while slaves advance 
With timid eye, to read the distant glance; 
Who with sad prayers the weary doctor tease, 
To name the nameless ever-new disease; 
Who with mock patience dire complaints endure, 
Which real pain, and that alone, can cure; 



— 68 — 

How would ye bear in real pain to lie, 

Despised, neglected, left alone to die ? 

How would ye bear to draw your latest breath 

Where all that's wretched paves the way for death ? 

Such is that room which one rude beam divides, 
And naked rafters form the sloping sides; 
Where the vile bands that bind the thatch are seen, 
And lath and mud are all that lie between, 
Save one dull pane that, coarsely patched, gives way 
To the rude tempest, yet excludes the day; 
Here, on a matted flock, with dust o'erspread, 
The drooping wretch reclines his languid head; 
For him no hand the cordial cup applies, 
Or wipes the tear that stagnates in his eyes; 
No friends with soft discourse his pain beguile, 
Or promise hope till sickness wears a smile. 
But soon a loud and hasty summons calls, 
Shakes the thin roof and echoes round the walls; 
Anon a figure enters, quaintly neat, 
All pride and business, bustle and conceit, 
With looks unaltered by these scenes of woe, 
With speed that, entering, speaks his haste to go; 
He bids the gazing throng around him fly, 
And carries fate and physic in his eye: 
A potent quack, long versed in human ills, 
Who first insults the victim whom he kills; 
Whose murderous hand a drowsy Bench protect, 
And whose most tender mercy is neglect. 

Paid by the parish for attendance here, 
He wears contempt upon his sapient sneer; 
In haste he seeks the bed where misery lies, 
Impatience marked in his averted eyes; 
And, some habitual queries hurried o'er, 
Without reply, he rushes to the door. 



-6g - 

His drooping patient, long inured to pain, 
And long unheeded, knows remonstrance vain: 
He ceases now the feeble help to crave 
Of man; and, silent, sinks into the grave. 



John Keats (1795-1821). — The most meteoric 
figure in the literature of the early decades of the 
nineteenth century is John Keats. Dying in his 
twenty-fifth year, before the intellect of most men 
has developed sufficiently to allow them to judge 
wisely, or bring out in good taste the whisperings of 
genius, it is to be wondered at that Keats enjoys the 
fame which posterity joins in giving him. His first 
poem, " Endymion," was savagely criticised, and we 
are told he suffered such profound melancholy in con- 
sequence that only the strictest watching prevented 
him from committing suicide. But his other poems, 
especially " Hyperion," were received with less hos- 
tile criticism, and he gained much spirit. When his 
age is taken into account, the poems of Keats must 
be considered better than the work of many poets of 
like age, yet I have not derived the pleasure from 
reading his lines that others do, and I have failed to 
find just ground to attribute claims of great genius 
to him. Keats had " walked the hospitals," and 
had prepared himself to practice medicine. He was 
about to engage as ship-surgeon when consumption, 
from which he had long been a sufferer, carried him 
off. 



— yo — 

TO AUTUMN. 

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness ! 

Close bosom friend of the maturing sun; 

Conspiring with him how to load and bless 

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run; 

To bend with apples the mossed cottage tree, 

And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; 

To swell the gourd and plump the hazel shells 

With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, 

And still more, later flowers for the bees, 

Until they think warm days will never cease, 

For summer has o'er-brimmed their clammy cells. 

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store ? 

Sometimes, whoever seeks abroad may find 

Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, 

Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; 

Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep, 

Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook 

Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers; 

And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep 

Steady thy laden head across a brook; 

Or by a cider-press with patient look 

Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours. 

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? 

Think not of them; thou hast thy music too, 

While barred clouds bloom o'er the soft dying day 

And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; 

Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn 

Among the river swallows, borne aloft, 

Or sinking, as the light wind lives or dies; 

And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; 

Hedge-crickets sing; and now, with treble soft, 

The redbreast whistles from a garden croft, 

And gathering swallows twitter from the skies. 



— 7i — 

ON ENGLAND. 

Happy is England! I could be content 

To see no other verdure than its own; 

To feel no other breezes than are blown 

Through its tall woods, with high romances blent. 

Yet do I sometimes feel a languishment 

For skies Italian, and an inward groan 

To sit upon an Alp as on a throne, 

And half forget what world or worlding meant. 
Happy is England, sweet her artless daughters; 

Enough their simple loveliness for me; 
Enough their whitest arms in silence clinging; 

Yet do I often warmly burn to see 
Beauties of deeper glance, and hear their singing, 
And float with them about their summer waters. 

James Currie (1756 ). — The name of James 

Currie will always be prominent in British biography. 
He was one of the greatest practitioners and reform- 
ers of his particular day, having been the first to call 
attention to the value of water in the treatment of 
fevers. He contributed to literature. He wrote a 
life of Robert Burns, and edited an edition of his 
works. It is said many of Burns' poems owe much to 
the touches which were given to them by Currie. 

I can give no quotation from him that would be 
of value in the small space at my command. 

David Macbeth Moir (1798-185 1). — One of 
the sweetest of all the bards who have ever sung was 
David Macbeth Moir. He practiced medicine suc- 
cessfully, and was greatly beloved by all who knew 



— 72 — 
him. He was a faithful and constant contributor to 
Blackwood's Magazine. His writings cover a large 
field, and the most prominent among them are "The 
Legend of Genevieve, with Other Tales and Poems," 
" Outlines of the Ancient History of Medicine," 
" Domestic Verses," " Sketches of the Poetical Liter- 
ature of the Past Half Century," etc. The following 
poem, while inferior to much of his verse, will give 
the reader an idea of the drift of his genius: 

WHEN THOU AT EVE ART ROAMING. 

When thou at eve art roaming 

Along the elm-o'ershaded walk, 
Where fast the eddying stream is foaming, 
And falling down, a cataract — 

'Twas there with thee I wont to talk — 
Think thou upon the days gone by, 
And heave a sigh. 

When sails the moon above the mountains, 
And cloudless skies are purely blue, 

And sparkle in her light the fountains, 
And darker frowns the lonely yew, 
Then be thou melancholy too 
While pausing on the hours I proved 
With thee beloved. 

When wakes the dawn upon thy dwelling, 
And lingering shadows disappear, 

As soft the woodland songs are swelling 
A choral anthem on thine ear, 
Muse, for that hour to thought is dear, 
And then its flight remembrance wings 
To bypast things. 



— 73 — 

To me through every season dearest; 

In every scene by day, by night, 
Thou present to my mind appearest 

A quenchless star forever bright; 

My solitary, sole delight; 

Where'er I am — by shore — at sea — 
I think of thee ! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809 ). — Dr. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes is probably the most dis- 
tinguished living example, of the physician and 
litterateur combined. His works are universally read 
and admired, and he is the darling of the American 
profession and people. He was Professor of Anatomy 
and Physiology in Dartmouth College, and from 1847 
until his resignation was Professor of Anatomy in Har- 
vard. I make quotations below of several of his poems 
which I have always regarded as his happiest flights. 

I have given but little account of his life and 
literary activity, because he is already so well known 
to the world. 

THE stethoscope song. 

A Professional Ballad. 

There was a young man in Boston town, 
He bought him a Stethoscope nice and new, 

All mounted and finished and polished down, 
With an ivory cap and a stopper too. 

It happened a spider within did crawl 

And spun him a web of ample size, 
Wherein there chanced one day to fall 

A couple of very imprudent flies. 



— 74 — 

The first was a bottle-fly, big and blue; 

The second was smaller, and thin and long; 
So there was a concert between the two, 

Like an octavo flute and a tavern gong. 

Now, being from Paris but recently, 

This fine young man would show his skill; 

And so they gave him, his hand to try, 
A hospital patient extremely ill. 

Some said that his liver was short of bile, 
Aud some that his heart was over size, 

While some kept arguing all the while 

He was crammed with tubercles up to his eyes. 

This fine young man then up stepped he, 
And all the doctors made a pause. 

Said he: "The man must die, you see, 
By the fifty-seventh of Louis's laws. 

"But since the case is a desperate one, 
To explore his chest it may be well; 

For if he should die and it were not done, 
You know the autopsy would not tell." 

Then out his stethoscope he took, 

And on it placed his curious ear; 
" Mon Dieu!" said he, with a knowing look, 

"Why, here is a sound that's mighty queer! 

"The bourdonnement is very clear — 

Amphoric buzzing, as I'm alive!" 
Five doctors took their turn to hear; 

"Amphoric buzzing" said all the five. 

"There's empyema, beyond a doubt; 

We'll plunge a trocar in his side." — 
The diagnosis was made out, 

They tapped the patient; so he died. 



— 75 — 

Now, such as hate new-fashioned toys 

Began to look extremely glum; 
They said that rattles were made for boys, 

And vowed that his buzzing was all a hum. 

There was an old lady had long been sick, 
And what was the matter none did know; 

Her pulse was slow, though her tongue was quick; 
To her this knowing youth must go. 

So there the nice old lady sat, 

With phials and boxes all in a row; 
She asked the young doctor what he was at, 

To thump her and tumble her ruffles so. 

Now, when the stethoscope came out, 

The flies began to buzz and whiz. — 
"Oho! the matter is clear, no doubt; 

An aneurism there plainly is. 

" The bruit de rape and the bruit de scie 
And the bruit de diable are all combined. 

How happy Bouillaud would be, 
If he a case like this could find! " 

Now, when the neighboring doctors found 

A case so rare had been described, 
They every day her ribs did pound 

In squads of twenty; so she died. 

Then six young damsels, slight and frail, 
Received this kind young doctor's cares; 

They all were getting slim and pale, 

And short of breath on mounting stairs. 

They all made rhymes with " sighs " and " skies," 
And loathed their puddings and buttered rolls, 

And dieted, much to their friends' surprise, 
On pickles and pencils and chalk and coals. 



_ 7 6 - 

So fast their little hearts did bound, 

The frightened insects buzzed the more; 

So over all their chests he found 
The rdle sifflant and the rale sonore. 

He shook his head: "There's grave disease; 

I greatly fear you all must die; 
A slight post-mortem, if you please, 

Surviving friends would gratify." 

The six young damsels wept aloud, 
Which so prevailed on six young men 

That each his honest love avowed, 
Whereat they all got well again. 

This poor young man was all aghast; 

The price of stethoscope came down; 
And so he was reduced at last 

To practice in a country town. 

The doctors, being very sore, 

A stethoscope they did devise 
That had a rammer to clear the bore, 

With a knob at the end to kill the flies. 

Now use your ears, all you that can, 
But don't forget to mind your eyes, 

Or you may be cheated, like this young man, 
By a couple of silly, abnormal flies. 

EXTRACTS FROM A MEDICAL POEM. 

The Stability of Science. 

The feeble sea-birds, blinded in the storms, 
On some tall lighthouse dash their little forms, 
And the rude granite scatters for their pains 
Those small deposits that were meant for brains. 



— 77 — 

Yet the proud fabric in the morning's sun 

Stands all unconscious of the mischief done; 

Still the red beacon pours its evening rays 

For the lost pilot with as full a blaze, 

Nay, shines, all radiance, o'er the scattered fleet 

Of gulls and boobies brainless at its feet. 

I tell their fate, though courtesy disclaims 

To call our kind by such ungentle names; 

Yet, if your rashness bid you vainly dare, 

Think of their doom, ye simple, and beware! 

See where aloft its hoary forehead rears 

The towering pride of twice a thousand years! 

Far, far below the vast incumbent pile 

Sleeps the gray rock from art's ^Egean isle; 

Its massive courses, circling as they rise, 

Swell from the waves to mingle with the skies; 

There every quarry lends its marble spoil, 

And clustering ages blend their common toil; 

The Greek, the Roman, reared its ancient walls, 

The silent Arab arched its mystic halls; 

In that fair niche, by countless billows laved, 

Trace the deep lines that Sydenham engraved; 

On yon broad front that breasts the changing swell, 

Mark where the ponderous sledge of Hunter fell; 

By the square buttress look where Louis stands, 

The stone yet warm from his uplifted hands; 

And say, O Science, shall thy life-blood freeze. 

When fluttering folly flaps on walls like these ? 

A Portrait. 

Thoughtful in youth, but not austere in age; 
Calm, but not cold, and cheerful though a sage; 
Too true to flatter, and too kind to sneer, 
And only just when seemingly severe; 



- 7 8 - 

So gently blending courtesy and art 

That wisdom's lips seemed borrowing friendship's heart. 

Taught by the sorrows that his age had known 

In others' trials to forget his own, 

As hour by hour his lengthened day declined, 

A sweeter radiance lingered o'er his mind. 

Cold were the lips that spoke his early praise, 

And hushed the voices of his morning days, 

Yet the same accents dwelt on every tongue, 

And love renewing kept him ever young, 

A Sentiment. 

OfiloS fipacxv — life is but a song; 
''llrsKvr? tictxpr] — art is wondrous long; 
Yet to the wise her paths are ever fair, 
And Patience smiles, though Genius may despair. 
Give us but knowledge, though by slow degrees, 
And blend our toil with moments bright as these; 
Let Friendship's accents cheer our doubtful way, 
And Love's pure planet lend its guiding ray, 
Our tardy Art shall wear an angel's wings, 
And life shall lengthen with the joy it brings 

THE VOICELESS. 

We count the broken lyres that rest 
Where the sweet-wailing singers slumber, 

But o'er their silent sister's breast 
The wild-flowers who will stoop to number? 

A few can touch the magic string, 
And noisy Fame is proud to win them: — 

Alas for those that never sing, 
But die with all their music in them! 



— 79 — 

Nay, grieve not for the dead alone 
Whose song has told their heart's sad story — 

Weep for the voiceless, who have known 
The cross without the crown of glory! 

Not where Leucadian breezes sweep 
O'er Sappho's memory-haunted billow, 

But where the glistening night-dews weep 
On nameless sorrow's churchyard pillow. 

O hearts that break and give no sign 
Save whitening lip and fading tresses, 

Till Death pours out his cordial wine 
Slow-dropped from Misery's crushing presses, — 

If singing breath or echoing chord 
To every hidden pang were given, 

What endless melodies were poured, 
As sad as earth, as sweet as heaven! 

THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS. 

This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign, 

Sails the unshadowed main — 

The venturous bark that flings 
On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings 
In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings, 

And coral reefs lie bare, 
Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair. 

Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl; 

Wrecked is the ship o'f pearl! 

And every chambered cell 
Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell, 
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell, 

Before thee lies revealed — 
Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed! 



_- 80 — 

Year after year beheld the silent toil 

That spread his lustrous coil; 

Still, as the spiral grew, 
He left the past year's dwelling for the new, 
Stole with soft step its shining archway through, 

Built up its idle door, 
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more 

Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee, 

Child of the wandering sea, 

Cast from her lap, forlorn! 
From thy dead lips a clearer note is born 
Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn' 

While on mine ear it rings, 
Through the deep cave of thought I hear a voice that sings: — 

Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, 

As the swift seasons roll! 

Leave thy low-vaulted past! 
Let each new temple, nobler than the last, 
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, 

Till thou at length art free, 
Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea! 

RIP VAN WINKLE, M.D. 

An after-dinner prescription taken by the Massachusetts Medical 
Society, at their meeting held May 23, 1870. 

CANTO FIRST. 

Old Rip Van Winkle had a grandson, Rip, 
Of the paternal block a genuine chip — 
A lazy, sleepy, curious kind of chap; 
He, like his grandsire, took a mighty nap, 
Whereof the story I propose to tell 
In two brief cantos, if you listen well. 



— Si — 

The times were hard when Rip to manhood grew; 
They always will be when there's work to do. 
He tried at farming — found it rather slow — 
And then at teaching — what he didn't know; 
Then took to hanging round the tavern bars, 
To frequent toddies and long-nine cigars, 
Till Dame Van Winkle, out of patience, vexed 
With preaching homilies, having for their text 
A mop, a broomstick — aught that might avail 
To point a moral or adorn a tale — 
Exclaimed: " I have it ! Now then, Mr. V.! 
He's good for something — make him an M. D. ! " 

The die was cast; the youngster was content; 

They packed his shirts and stockings, and he went. 

How hard he studied it were vain to tell; 

He drowsed through Wistar, nodded over Bell, 

Slept sound with Cooper, snored aloud on Good; 

Heard heaps of lectures — doubtless understood — 

A constant listener, for he did not fail 

To carve his name on every bench and rail. 

Months grew to years; at last he counted three, 

And Rip Van Winkle found himself M. D. 

Illustrious title ! in a gilded frame 

He set the sheepskin with his Latin name, 

Ripum Van Winklum, quem we — scimus — know 

Idoneum esse — to do so-and-so. 

He hired an office; soon its walls displayed 

His new diploma and his stock in trade, 

A mighty arsenal to subdue disease, 

Of various names, whereof I mention these: 

Lancets and bougies, great and little squirt, 

Rhubarb and senna, snakeroot, thoroughwort, 

Ant. tart., vin. colch., pil. cochiae, and black drop, 

6 GGG 



— 82 — 

Tinctures of opium, gentian, henbane, hop, 
Pulv. ipecacuanhas — which, for lack 
Of breath to utter, men call ipecac — 
Camphor and kino, turpentine, tolu, 
Cubebs, "copeevy," vitriol — white and blue, 
Fennel and flaxseed, slippery elm and squill, 
And roots of sassafras, and " sassaf'rill;" 
Brandy — for colics; pinkroot — death on worms; 
Valerian, calmer of hysteric squirms; 
Musk; asafcetida, the resinous gum 
Named from its odor — well, it does smell some — 
Jalap, that works not wisely but too well; 
Ten pounds of bark and six of calomel. 

For outward griefs he had an ample store, 

Some twenty jars and gallipots, or more: 

Ceratum simplex — housewives oft compile 

The same at home, and call it " wax and ile;" 

Unguentum Resinosum — change its name, 

The "drawing salve" of many an ancient dame; 

Argenti Nitras; also Spanish flies, 

Whose virtue makes the water-bladders rise — 

(Some say that spread upon the toper's skin 

They draw no water, only rum or gin) — 

Leeches, sweet vermin! don't they charm the sick ? 

And sticking-plaster — how it hates to stick! 

Emplastrum Ferri — ditto Picis, pitch; 

Washes and powders; brimstone for the — which, 

Scabies or psora, is thy chosen name 

Since Hahnemann's goose-quill scratched thee into fame, 

Proved thee the source of every nameless ill, 

Whose sole specific is a moonshine pill, 

Till saucy Science, with a quiet grin, 

Held up the Acarus, crawling on a pin ? 

— Mountains have labored and have brought forth mice: 



- 83 - 

The Dutchman's theory hatched a brood of twice 

I've wellnigh said them — words unfitting quite 
For these fair precincts and for ears polite. 

The surest foot may chance at last to slip, 
And so at length it proved with Doctor Rip. 
One full-sized bottle stood upon the shelf 
Which held the medicine which he took himself; 
Whate'er the reason, it must be confessed 
He filled that bottle oftener than the rest; 
What drug it held I don't presume to know — 
The gilded label said: " Elixir Pro." 

One day the Doctor found the bottle full, 
And, being thirsty, took a vigorous pull, 
Put back the " Elixir" where 'twas always found, 
And had old Dobbin saddled and brought round. 
— You know those old-time rhubarb-colored nags 
That carried doctors and their saddle-bags; 
Sagacious beasts! they stopped at every place 
Where blinds were shut — knew every patient's case — 
Looked up and thought — the baby's in a fit — 
That won't last long — he'll soon be through with it; 
But shook their heads before the knockered door 
Where some old lady told the story o'er 
Whose endless stream of tribulation flows 
For gastric griefs and peristaltic woes. 

What jack-o'-lantern led him from his way, 
And where it led him, it were hard to say; 
Enough that, wandering many a weary mile 
Through paths the mountain sheep trod single file, 
O'ercome by feelings such as patients know 
Who dose too freely with " Elixir Pro.," 
He tumbl — dismounted, slightly in a heap, 
And lay, promiscuous, lapped in balmy sleep. 



Night followed night, and day succeeded day, 

But snoring still the slumbering Doctor lay. 

Poor Dobbin, starving, thought upon his stall, 

And straggled homeward, saddle-bags and all. 

The village people hunted all around, 

But Rip was missing — never could be found. 

" Drownded," they guessed; — for more than half a year 

The pouts and eels did taste uncommon queer, 

Some said of apple-brandy — other some 

Found a strong flavor of New England rum. 

— Why can't a fellow hear the fine things said 
About a fellow when a fellow's dead? 
The best of doctors — so the press declared — 
A public blessing while his life was spared, 
True to his country, courteous to the poor, 
In all things temperate, sober, just, and pure; 
The best of husbands! echoed Mrs. Van, 
And set her cap to catch another man. 

— So ends this Canto — if it's quantum suff., 
We'll just stop here and say we've had enough, 
And leave poor Rip to sleep for thirty years. 
I grind the organ — if you lend your ears 
To hear my second Canto; after that 
We'll send around the monkey with the hat. 

CANTO SECOND. 

So thirty years had passed — but not a word 

In all that time of Rip was ever heard; 

The world wagged on — it never does go back — 

The widow Van was now the widow Mac — 

France was an empire — Andrew J. was dead, 

And Abraham L. was reigning in his stead. 

Four murderous years had passed in savage strife,. 



- 8 5 - 

Yet still the rebel held his bloody knife. 

— At last one morning — who forgets the day 

When the black cloud of war dissolved away ? — 

The joyous tidings spread o'er land and sea, 

Rebellion done for! Grant has captured Lee! 

Up every flagstaff sprang the Stars and Stripes — 

Out rushed the " extras " wild with mammoth types — 

Down went the laborer's hod, the schoolboy's book: 

*' Hooraw! " he cried, " the rebel army's took! " 

Ah! what a time! the folks all mad with joy: 

Each fond, pale mother thinking of her boy; 

Old gray-haired fathers meeting — Have — you — heard ? 

And then a choke — and not another word; 

Sisters all smiling — maidens, not less dear, 

In trembling poise between a smile and tear; 

Poor Bridget thinking how she'll stuff the plums 

In that big cake for Johnny when he comes; 

Cripples afoot; rheumatics on the jump; 

Old girls so loving they could hug the pump; 

Guns going bang! from every fort and ship — 

They banged so loud at last they wakened Rip. 

I spare the picture, how a man appears 
Who's been asleep a score or two of years; 
You all have seen it to perfection done 
By Joe Van Wink— I mean Rip Jefferson. 
Well, so it was; old Rip at last came back, 
Claimed his old wife — the present widow Mac — 
Had his old sign regilded, and began 
To practice physic on the same old plan. 

Some weeks went by — it was not long to wait — 
And " Please to call" grew frequent on the slate. 
He had, in fact, an ancient, mildewed air, 
A long gray beard, a plenteous lack of hair — 



— 86 — 

The musty look that always recommends 
Your good old doctor to his ailing friends. 
— Talk of your science! after all is said 
There's nothing like a bare and shining head; 
Age lends the graces that are sure to please; 
Folks want their doctors mouldy, like their cheese. 

So Rip began to look at people's tongues 

And thump their briskets (called it " sound theirjlungs "), 

Brushed up his knowledge smartly as he could, 

Read in old Cullen and in Doctor Good. 

The town was healthy; for a month or two 

He gave the sexton little work to do. 

About the time when dog-day heats begin, 
The summer's usual maladies set in; 
With autumn evenings dysentery came, 
And dusky typhoid lit his smouldering flame; 
The blacksmith ailed, the carpenter was down, 
And half the children sickened in the town. 
The sexton's face grew shorter than before — 
The sexton's wife a brand-new bonnet wore — 
Things looked quite serious — Death had got a grip 
On old and young, in spite of Doctor Rip. 

And now the Squire was taken with a chill — 
Wife gave " hot drops " — at night an Indian pill; 
Next morning, feverish; bedtime, getting worse — 
Out of his head — began to rave and curse; 
The Doctor sent for — double-quick he came: 
Ant. Tart. gran, duo, and repeat the same 
If no et cetera. Third day — nothing new; 
Percussed his thorax till 'twas black and blue — 
Lung-fever theatening — something of the sort — 
Out with the lancet — let him bleed — a quart — 
Ten leeches next — then blisters to his side — 
Ten grains of calomel — Just then he died. 



- 8 7 - 

The Deacon next required the Doctor's care — 

Took cold by sitting in a draught of air — 

Pains in the back, but what the matter is 

Not quite so clear — wife calls it " rheumatiz." 

Rubs back with flannel — gives him something hot — 

"Ah ! " says the Deacon, " that goes nigh the spot." 

Next day a rigor — " Run, my little man, 

And say the Deacon sends for Doctor Van." 

The Doctor came — percussion as before, 

Thumping and banging till his ribs were sore — 

" Right side the flattest" — then more vigorous raps — 

" Fever — that's certain — pleurisy, perhaps. 

A quart of blood will ease the pain, no doubt, 

Ten leeches next will help to suck it out, 

Then clap a blister on the painful part — 

But first two grains of Antimonium Tart.; 

Last, with a dose of cleansing calomel 

Unload the portal system — (that sounds well !)" 

But when the selfsame remedies were tried, 
As all the village knew, the Squire had died; 
The neighbors hinted: "This will never do; 
He's killed the Squire — he'll kill the Deacon too." 

— Now when a doctor's patients are perplexed, 

A consultation comes in order next — 

You know what that is ? In a certain place 

Meet certain doctors to discuss a case 

And other matters, such as weather, crops, 

Potatoes, pumpkins, lager beer, and hops. 

For what's the use? — there's little to be said; 

Nine times in ten your man's as good as dead; 

At best a talk (the secret to disclose) 

Where three men guess and sometimes one man knows. 



The counsel summoned came without delay — 

Young Doctor Green and shrewd old Doctor Gray. 

They heard the story — " Bleed?" says Doctor Green — 

"That's downright murder ! Cut his throat, you mean ! 

Leeches ! the reptiles ! Why, for pity's sake, 

Not try an adder or a rattlesnake? 

Blisters ! Why, bless you, they're against the law — 

It's rank assault and battery if they draw ! 

Tartrate of antimony ! shade of Luke, 

Stomachs turn pale at thought of such rebuke ! 

The portal system ! What's the man about? 

Unload your nonsense ! Calomel's played out ! 

You've been asleep — you'd better sleep away 

Till some one calls you." 

" Stop !" says Doctor Gray — 
"The story is you slept for thirty years; 
With brother Green, I own that it appears 
You must have slumbered most amazing sound; 
But sleep once more till thirty years come round, 
You'll find the lancet in its honored place, 
Leeches and blisters rescued from disgrace, 
Your drugs redeemed from fashion's passing scorn 
And counted safe to give to babes unborn." 

Poor sleepy Rip, M. M. S. S., M. D., 

A puzzled, serious, saddened man was he; 

Home from the Deacon's house he plodded slow 

And filled one bumper of " Elixir Pro." 

" Good by," he faltered, " Mrs. Van, my dear ! 

I'm going to sleep; but wake me once a year; 

I don't like bleaching in the frost and dew — 

I'll take the barn, if all the same to you. 

Just once a year — remember ! no mistake ! 



Cry, ' Rip Van Winkle ! time for you to wake !' 
Watch for the week in May when laylocks blow, 
For then the doctors meet, and I must go." 

Just once a year the Doctor's worthy dame 

Goes to the barn and shouts her husband's name: 

" Come, Rip Van Winkle !" (giving him a shake) 

" Rip ! Rip Van Winkle ! time for you to wake ! 

Laylocks in blossom ! 'tis the month of May — 

The doctors' meeting is this blessed day, 

And, come what will, you know I heard you swear 

You'd never miss it, but be always there !" 

And so it is, as every year comes round 
Old Rip Van Winkle here is always found. 
You'll quickly know him by his mildewed air, 
The hayseed sprinkled through his scanty hair, 
The lichens growing on his rusty suit — 
I've seen a toadstool sprouting on his boot — 
Who says I lie? Does any man presume? — 
Toadstool? No matter — call it a mushroom. 
Where is his seat? He moves it every year; 
But look, you'll find him — he is always here — 
Perhaps you'll track him by a whiff you know, 
A certain flavor of " Elixir Pro." 

Now, then, I give you — as you seem to think 
We can give toasts without a drop to drink — 
Health to the mighty sleeper — long live he ! 
Our brother Rip, M. M. S. S., M. D.! 

Charles James Lever. — All who have read the 
" Confession of Harry Lorrequer," "Charles O'Mal- 
ley," or other of his novels in which Irish character 
and Irish wit are set forth in their truest colors, will not 



— 9° — 
deny that Lever was a genius of the first order. He 
began the practice of medicine in Ireland, and pursued 
it with great success. In consideration of noble pro- 
fessional services rendered in 1832, when cholera was 
epidemic, he was appointed physician to the British 
embassy at Brussels, and when his success, as an 
author became pronounced he retired from the prac- 
tice. He has written a number of books which have 
had a phenomenal sale and have contributed to the 
merriment of the world. One who does this is a 
benefactor. 

We cannot quote in this limited space anything 
from this author and do him justice. 

Dr. John William Draper.— One of the most 
distinguished gentlemen in our profession is Dr. John 
William Draper, Professor of Chemistry in the Uni- 
versity of New York. His great work, " History of 
the Conflict between Religion and Science," is one of 
the most philosophical works in the English language, 
and the author's fame would be secure had he 
written nothing slse. His " Human Physiology " 
and "Organization of Plants" are works which wilL 
endure. We can make no quotation from his works 
because they would demand more space than can be 
allowed. 



INDEX TO AUTHORS AND QUOTATIONS. 



Page. 

Akenside, Mark 44 

Inscription for a Monument to Shakespeare 45 

Inscription for a Statue of Chaucer at Woodstock. . 46 

Patriotism 44 

Arbuthnot, Dr. John 36 

Know Thyself 40 

Usefulness of Mathematical Learning 37 

Armstrong, John 51 

Over-indulgence in Wine 52 

Pestilence of the Fifteenth Century 53 

Blackmore, Sir Richard 33 

The Scheme of Creation 36 

Browne, Sir Thomas 16 

Oblivion 18 

Of Myself 25 

Charleton, Dr. Walter 25 

The Ready and Nimble Wit 26 

The Slow but Sure Wit 2& 

Crabbe, George •. 66 

The Parish Workhouse and Apothecary (from "The 

Village " ) 67 

Currie, James 71 

Darwin, Dr. Erasmus 57 

Death of Eliza at the Battle of Minden (from the 

" Loves of the Plants") 60 



— 9 2 — 

Page. 
Invocation to the Goddess of Botany (from the 

" Botanic Garden ") 58 

Song to Echo 62 

Draper, Dr. John William go 

Garth, Sir Samuel 29 

Extract from " The Dispensary " 30 

On Death 33 

Goldsmith, Oliver 55 

Extracts from " The Traveller" : 56 

Holmes, Oliver Wendell 73 

Extracts from a Medical Poem— The Stability of 

Science; a Portrait; a Sentiment 78 

Rip Van Winkle, M.D 80 

The Chambered Nautilus 79 

The Stethoscope Song 73 

The Voiceless. . . . 78 

Keats, John 69 

On England 71 

To Autumn. 70 

Lever, Charles James 89 



Locke, John 6 

Causes of Weakness in Men's Understandings 9 

Christmas Ceremonies at Cleves 7 

History 14 

Pleasure and Pain ' 12 

Moir, David Macbeth 71 

When Thou at Eve Art Roaming 72 

Smollett, Tobias George 46 

Ode to Independence 74 



— 93 — 

Page. 

Vaughan, Henry 3 

Early Rising and Prayer 4 

The Rainbow 5 

Wolcott, Dr. John 62 

The Apple Dumpling and a King 65 

The Pilgrims and the Peas 63 



How to Administer Iron. 



It is generally conceded that the officinal tincture 
of chloride of iron is the most valuable of the iron 
preparations therapeutically. The practical difficulties 
attending its administration for a length of time have 
been its disagreeably astringent taste, its corrosive 
action on the teeth, and its constipating action. 

Dr. G. W. Weld's extensive experience in the 
practice of dentistry led him to recognize the virtues 
of the tincture of the chloride of iron as a stimulant 
resource for patients after the strain of the dentist's 
work. Repeated experiments to obtain a formula free 
from the objectionable features resulted in the prepara- 
tion of a highly palatable syrup, with all the therapeu- 
tic efficacy preserved. This has been extensively tested 
and placed in the hands of Parke, Davis & Co. for 
manufacture, who strongly recommend it to the medi- 
cal profession for trial. Being prepared after Dr. 
Weld's formula, it is entitled Weld's Syrup of Iron 
Chloride (P., D. & Co.'s). It is believed it will effect a 
revolution in iron administration. 

Samples will be sent, on receipt of request, to 
physicians who indicate their willingness to pay ex- 
press charges. 



PARKE, DAVIS & COMPANY, 

DETROIT, NEW YORK AND KANSAS CITY. 



su emtin <>* publications 

— OF - 

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N EXPLANATION 

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Tie Pteiciais' Leisure Library. 



We have made a new departure in the publication of medical books. As you 
no doubt know, many of the large treatises published, which sell for four or five or 
more dollars, contain much irrelevant matter of no practical value to the physi- 
cian, and their high price makes it often impossible for the average practitioner to 
purchase anything like a complete library. 

Believing that short practical treatises, prepared by well known authors, con- 
taining the gist of what they had to say regarding the treatment of diseases com- 
monly met with, and of which they had made a special study, sold at a small price, 
would be welcomed by the majority of the profession, we have arranged for the 
publication of such a series, calling it Tlie Physicians' Leisure Library. 

This series has met with the approval and appreciation of the medical profes- 
sion, and we shall continue to issue in it books by eminent authors of this country 
and Europe, covering the best modern treatment of prevalent diseases. 

The series will certainly afford practitioners and students an opportunity 
never before presented for obtaining a working library of books by the best authors 
at a price which places them within the reach of all. The books are amply illus- 
trated, and issued in attractive form. 

They may be had bound, either in durable paper covers at 25 Cts. per copy, 
or in cloth at 50 Cts. per copy. Complete series of 12 books in sets as announced, 
at $2.50, in paper, or cloth at $5.00, postage prepaid. See complete list. 



PHYSICIANS' LEISURE LIBRARY 



PRICE: PAPER, 25 CTS. PER COPY, $2.50 PER SET; CLOTH, 50 CTS. PER COPY, 
$5.00 PER SET. 



SERIES I. 



Inhalers, Inhalations and Inhalants. 
By Beverley Robinson, M. D. 

The Use of Electricity in the Removal of 
Superfluous Hair and the Treatment of 
Various Facial Blemishes. 
By Geo. Henry Fox, M. D. 
New Medications, Vol. I. 

By Dujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 
New Medications. Vol. II. 



n iviec 
ByD 



ujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 

The Modern Treatment of Ear Diseases. 
By Samuel Sexton, M. D. 

The Modern Treatment of Eczema 
By Henry G. Piffard, M. D. 



Antiseptic Midwifery. 

By Henry J. Garrigues, M. D. 
On the Determination of the Necessity for 
Wearing Glasses. 

By D. B. St. John Roosa, M. D. 
The Physiological, Pathological and Ther- 
apeutic Effects of Compressed Air. 

By Andrew H. Smith, M. D. 
GranularLids and ContagiousOphthalmia. 

By W. F. Mittendorf, M. D. 
Practical Bacteriology. 

BvThomas E. Satterthwaile, M. D. 
Pregnancy, Parturition, the Puerperal 
State and their Complications. 

By Paul F. Munde, M. D. 



SERIES II. 



The Diagnosis and Treatment of Haem- 
orrhoids 

By Chas. B. Kelsey, M. D. 
Diseases of the Heart, Vol. I. 

By Dujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 
Diseases of the Heart, Vol. II. 

By Dujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 
The Modern Treatment of Diarrhoea and 
Dysentery. 

By A. B. Palmer, M. D. 
ntestinal Diseases of Children, Vol. I. 

By A. Jacobi, M. D. 
Intestinal Diseases of Children, Vol. II. 

By A. Jacobi, M. D. 



The Modern Treatment of Headaches. 
By Allan McLane Hamilton, M. D. 

The Modern Treatment of Pleurisy and 
Pneumonia. 

By G. M. Garland, M. D. 
Diseases of the Male Urethra. 

By Fessenden N. Otis, M. D. 
The Disorders of Menstruation. 

By Edward W. Jenks, M. D. 
The Infectious Diseases, Vol. I. 

By Karl Liebermeister. 

The Infectious Diseases, Vol. 
By Karl Liebermeister. 



SERIES III. 



Abdominal Surgery. 

By Hal C. Wyman, M. D. 

Diseases of the Liver 

By Dujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 

Hysteria and Epilepsy. 

By J. Leonard Corning, M. D. 

Diseases of the Kidney. 

By Dujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 

The Theory and Practice of the Ophthal- 
moscope. 

By J. Herbert Claiborne, Jr., M. D. 

Modern Treatment of Bright's Disease. 
By Alfred L. Loomis, M. D. 



Clinical Lectures on Certain Diseases o 
Nervous System. 

By Prof. J. M. Charcot, M. D. 
The Radical Cure of Hernia. 

By Henry O. Marcy, A. M., M. D., 
L. L. D. 
Spinal Irritation. 

By William A. Hammond, M. D . 
Dyspepsia. 

By Frank Woodbury, M. D. 
The Treatment of the Morphia Habit. 

By Erlenmeyer. 
The Etiology, Diagnosis and Therapy of 
Tuberculosis 

By Prof. H. von Ziemssen. 



SERIES IV. 



Nervous Syphilis. 

By H . C. Wood, M. D. 

Education and Culture as correlated to 
the Health and Diseases of Women. 
By A. J. C.Skene, M. D. 

Diabetes. 

By A. H. Smith, M. D. 

A Treatise on Fractures. 

By Armand Despres, M. D. 

Some Majorand Minor Fallacies concern- 
ing Syphilis. 

By E. L. Keyes, M .D. 
Hypodermic Medication. 

By Bourneville and Bricon. 



Practical Points in the Management o 
Diseases of Children. 
By I. N. Love, M. D. 

Neuralgia. 

By E. P. Hurd, M. D. 

Rheumatism and Gout. 

By F. Le Roy Satterlee, M. D. 
Electricity, Its Application in Medicine. 

B y Wellington Adams, M . D . [Vol. I] 
Electricity, Its Application In Medicine. 

By Wellington Adams, M.D. [Vol.11] 
Auscultation and Percussion. 

By Frederick C. Shattuck, M. D. 



Taking Cold. 

By F. H. Bosworth, M. D. 

Practical Notes on Urinary Analysis. 
By William B. Canfield, M. D. 

Practical Intestinal Surgery, Vol.1. 

Practical Intestinal Surgery. Vol.11. 

By F. B. Robinson, M. D. 

Lectures on Tumors. 

By John B. Hamilton, M. D., LL. D. 

Pulmonary Consumption, a Nervous Dis- 
ease. 

By Thomas J. Mays, M.D. 



SERIES V. 

Artificial Anaesthetics and Anaesthesia. 
By DeForest Willard, M. D., and Dr. 
Lewis H. Adler, Jr. 

Lessons in the Diagnosisand Treatment 
of Eye Diseases. 

By Casey A. Wood, M. D. 

The Modern Treatment of Hip Disease 
By Charles F. Stillman, M. D. 

Diseases of the Bladder and Prostate 
By Hal C. Wyman, M. D. 

Cancer. 

By Daniel Lewis, M. D. 
Insomnia and Hypnotics. 

By Germain See. 

Translated by E. P. Hurd, M. D. 



The Uses of Water in Modern Medicine 
Vol. I . 



SERIES VI.* 

Gonorrhoea and Its Treatment. 
By G. Frank Lydston, M.D. 



The Uses of Water in Modern Medicine. 
Vol. II. 
By Simon Baruch, M.D. 

The Electro-Therapeutics of Gynaecol- 
ogy. Vol.1. 

The Electro-Therapeutics of Gynaecol- 
ogy. Vol. II, 

By A. H. Goelet, M D. 

Cerebral Meningitis. 

By Martin W. Barr, M, D. 

Contributions of Physicians to English 
and American Literature. 
By Robert C. Kenner, M.D. 



Acne and Alopecia. 

By L. Duncan Bulkley, M. D. 

Fissure of the Anus and Fistula in Ano 
By Dr. Lewis H. Adler, Jr. 

Modern Minor Surgical Gynaecology. 
By Edward W. Jenks, M.D. 

Massage and the Swedish Movement 
Cure. 

By Baron Nils Posse. 

Sexual Weakness and Impotence. 
By Edward Martin, M.D. 



* To be issued one a month during 1892. 



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SEXUAL IMPOTENCE IN MALE AND FEMALE $3.00 

By Wm. A. Hammond, M. D. 

PHYSICIANS' PERFECT VISITING LIST 1.50 

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A NEW TREATMENT OF CHRONIC METRITIS 50 

By Dr. Georges Apostoli. 

CLINICAL THERAPEUTICS 4.00 

By Dujardin-Beaumetz, M. D. 

MICROSCOPICAL DIAGNOSIS , 4.00 

By Prof. Chas. H. Stowell, M. S. 

PALATABLE PRESCRIBING 1 .00 

By B. W. Palmer, A. M., M. D. 

UNTOWARD EFFECTS OF DRUGS 2.00 

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SANITARY SUGGESTIONS (Paper) 25 

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TABLES FOR DOCTOR AND DRUGGIST 2.00 

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